


To the beat

by Cestakrve



Category: NKOTBSB Tour, New Kids On The Block
Genre: Dating, Drinking, F/M, Fun, Jokes, Swearing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-09
Updated: 2019-05-28
Packaged: 2019-07-10 05:19:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 36,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15942590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cestakrve/pseuds/Cestakrve
Summary: In this story we are meeting Emily Green, a former student of College of Journalism trying to live her dreams in Boston. Only a sheer luck tossed her into path of an elderly production lady of one of the most successful boy bands in history.This is a complete imagination of my mind. Here, every protagonist is between 28 and 35 and mostly single. Please do not throw rocks at me for not time based accuracy of this story. It is just a funny story of love, friendship, fun and some troubles.





	1. Stepping into it

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SweetyMole](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=SweetyMole).



> "Doing the thing we fear is the first step to success."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Doing the thing we fear is the first step to success."  
> -Mahátma Gándhí

She was late. Way too late. Too late for their liking. She would be unemployed in a moment, she felt it. The minute she would step in the door to the office, her boss would throw a box of her belongings at her and tell her to get lost. Well, she never liked that place anyway, but why she had to be so much late just now!

Her high heels were clicking a furious rhythm on the pavement and her sharp elbows were forcing other pedestrians to quickly step aside. Emily was not oversleeping often, she just had a few bad days and the transportation in such a big city as Boston was a disaster for the last week during this summer. All that made her to go late to her work in an office, where she worked as a manager assistant.

“Oi! Watch it!” complained a young man in a suit, when Emily´s elbow hit him between his shoulder blades.

“I am so sorry!” she called back at him.

Not watching, where she was going for a second, her heel got stuck in a pothole, her shoe slipped of and tripped her foot forward. She did a not very elegant and slow half-front flip and ended up on her back. She heard something ripping as she landed, probably her dress. She knew it was too tight for her, when she bought it, but no, she had to buy it to look lovely at her work with jealous coworkers and an abusive boss!

Now she was sitting on the pavement, trying to catch her breath and dignity. People were typically walking around her like they saw nothing, minding their own business, not caring about the poor lady, at the peak of crying, sitting on the ground.

“Poor thing, are you fine?” a nice crispy lady´s voice sounded next to her and a wrinkly helping hand appeared in her view. Emily held it and got up. It was like holding a warm leather glove.  
Her helper was a small old lady. She was holding her hand in her left one and a walking cane in the other. Her back was bowed a little. She looked old and tired, but the force, which she showed while pulling Emily up, signaled that this old granny still had some moves in her.  
She was wearing a loose blue blouse and long black skirt. Her face had a little bit of makeup and a thick small glasses. Her silver hair was tucked in a nice and firm bun at the top of her head with two knitting needles stuck in it to hold it tight.

“Are you ok, dear?” she asked again, dusting Emily´s dress off the mud.

“I am, thank you very much.” she tried to let go of the lady's hand, but she was holding it firmly like in a clamp. She was probably not noticing it at all, while she was trying to clean Emily.  
Then the old lady noticed the rip in the dress. Emily reached back and touched it. It was not that bad, but the dress was so short and tight, it practically showed her whole butt to the world. Emily quickly covered the hole with her free palm She could not possibly show at her workplace like that.

The old lady giggled and shook Emily´s hand in enjoyment: “Oh darling, I have a sewing kit back where I live. I can sew it in no time. Come, it is not far!”

It was not a question and the old grandma charged to her destination, dragging poor confused Emily behind her like a kite. Emily was not even able to protest. She was only able to pry her other heel off the hole in the pothole and put it back on her foot.  
Everytime she tried to tell the lady, that she has to hurry to work, she just giggled and waved at her like it was nothing important.

Well, she probably lost the work already, why bother to go there anyway? They were probably going to send her the dismiss letter via email and she could pick those few things she had there later. After a few seconds, Emily stopped struggling and let the old woman lead the way. Still she was trying to cover the hole in her dress with her free hand.

**********

To Emily's surprise, the old lady's home was not a small tidy flat painted in old pink, filled with croschettes and smelling of cats and mothballs. It was actually a bus. That type of small black busses, that can comfortably fit 8 to 12 people with their luggage and transport them for a short distance. This minibus was white, seemingly old and getting a bit rusty around the lights and wheels, but it looked like a sturdy vehicle.

“THIS is where you live?” Emily asked with worries. She probably got into hands of a crazy lady, who lived on the street and wants her kidneys or to distill her youth. She was after her mid-twenties, there was still some youth to steal from her.

“Do not worry, my dear. In there, I can sew it back together in no time,” she opened the side door to show that the back of the bus was cleaned off all six seats and instead of them, there was a small studio with build-in drawers and some small stands with clothings. It mostly consisted of shirts and male evening jackets. The only seats left in there was driver's seat, a small build-in stool nearby the drawers and two seats in the front.

“What is this?” asked Emily, as she sat into one of the remaining seats in front of the bus.

“This is my production bus, dear. I may not look like it, but I am still working hard. Yeah, weird, huh?” giggled the old lady, as she was closing the sliding bus door: “But who can blame me? I have to take care of five crazy young men, maybe as old as you are. There is only me between the group and jail for at least one of them.” she sat on a small stool near the drawers and started digging through them, probably looking for a sewing kit.

“Now for the dress, dearie, take it off. I think I have some stuff you can put on while I work on it,” she turned to the racks, “This could fit you nicely.”  
The lady gave Emily a white male tank top with black ornament, that was long enough to cover her essential ladies parts and ended just under her buttcheeks. The owner of it had to be buffed like a cloud since when she put it on, it hung on her loosely.

“I am still confused on what is going on. Everything happened so fast,” smiled Emily shyly. Thankfully all windows were smoky black and the granny politely turned her back to her.

“Well darling, you were in a hurry and you probably had a bad day already, so I wanted to help you. Also, you could not show at your work with ripped dress,” said the lady, sat down still with her back to Emily, and got to the sewing. “I apologise if I scared you, but it is kinda a work deformace to help immediately, when something happen and you looked like a nice girl.”

Emily turned red. She was thankful this lady stepped in. Her work was doomed already. But now, as she thought about it, she had no place to work and it would take a lot of time to find a good work here and she knew her boss would make her problems, wherever she goes. She put her chin in her palms and sighed.

The lady turned her head at her: “What's the matter, sugar?”

Emily thought of not talking to strangers about her work problems, but this lady was like her grandma and she felt like she was going to listen to her. So she told her everything.  
She talked about the time she moved from her hometown, just after her graduation, to this big city to ‘search for her happy ending and the prince in a shining armor’, but all she got was a tiny flat she shared with two other crazy girls, a shitty work and no man to love her even tho, she tried to visit some clubs and parties to get someone. Now she was turning 28 and nothing she set up to accomplish was done.

The lady was listening to his laments silently, while still sewing the dress, but making eye contact with her. Humming and frowning at the bad things and smiling and nodding at the nice things Emily told her about her life.

Emily ended the stream of words with a huge sigh. Then she realised how bad of a guest she was, not letting the lady talk, so she asked “Enough of me. What is your work, if I may ask?”

“Oh, nothing special, darling, I am a mere production lady of a band,” she smiled and her face wrinkled like a cute old apple.

That caught Emily´s interest. “That has to be a hard work. How many people you work with?”

“Mostly five men and that is way enough for such old bones as I am. Also the traveling is not good for my back either. I’m going to need an assistant soon.” Then she lifted her head up to Emily, an impish spark in her eyes. “Would you be interested in such work? Since I probably was the cause of you losing your previous job.”

Emily was speechless. It was true she graduated from Journalism and there she learned many things about not only media, but also music and film production.

“You would hire me?!” She yelped. This was almost her dream come true. The dream was to be a lost princess suddenly found, like in a “Princess diary”, but this was close enough! Helping a music band was a great way to use her skills and enthusiasm!

“Of course!” Giggled the old lady. “You look like a nice girl who would not slack on her work and I soon have to pass those five crazy guys to someone younger than me.”

“And what band is it?”

“Oh maybe you know them - It's New Kids On The Block.”


	2. Say what?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "We can only be afraid of fear itself."  
> \- Franklin D. Roosevelt, 32nd US President

2\. Say what?

Emily stood up so fast she hit her head on the ceiling of the bus. “Say WHAT?!” She yelped. 

The old lady was half surprised and half giggling to herself. “It seems like you know this pack of wild animals, dearie,” she was calmly finishing the sewing.

“Hell yeah I know them!” Emily sat back down, thinking if her dream of being a princess was actually not enough. Being a production lady for NKOTB was way better than sitting on a throne!

“I am taking it!”

“That's what I thought!” Answered lady with a smirk.

**********

After a few minutes of talking, Emily discovered that the old lady was called Lucy Black and she worked for this group since they started performing. At that time, they were like 16 years old and Lucy was a mother in need of money. Her kids grew up too fast and she practically adopted those dorky five boys.

Years went on and as the boys flowered into handsome men, Lucy was turning too old and slow to keep up with the pace of them. She did her best, being their friend and a guardian angel for most of their career, but now with the traveling and upcoming tour around South America, she knew she will not be able to do so.

“I care for their tour clothing. I have to order make up girls, check the lights and stage stuff with proper people, I sometimes even help with the ticket selling. And mostly, I have to make sure all five of them get to the stage sober and without missing parts. We used to have some problems. That one time in London, the only sober ones were Danny and Jordan. They had to bring those other three and practically hold them for the whole show. Thankfully, they all can sing pretty good even with 3 promiles in blood,” Lucy smiled sadly, lost in the good and bad memories.

“How will I be able to control such animals?” laughed Emily.  
She still could not believe her luck. She just got the work near one of her favourite bands! Not that she was still possessed like a crazy teenage fangirl, she already grew out of this, but she knew most of their songs and still had few of them in her mp3 accompanied by other 90´boy bands. And who would not want to meet a group you know and like?

“You will find a way to approach them and trust me, when the woman commands, they listen like a sheep, I trained them well,” giggled Lucy. “also I will be there for the start just to show you everything around and teach you the routine. So do not worry, there will be time to get used to them.”

*********

After that talk, Lucy gave Emily the dress back. There were almost no signs of any sewed up parts, that good this old lady was at it.

“Get dressed up, dear. I will wait outside and then we have to introduce you to the boys. They are currently in a nearby hotel resting. At least I hope. Donnie is really hard to hold in one place these days. It is probably a summer fever that got him. He is such a ladies man,” said Lucy and closed the bus door behind her.

Emily put her dress back on, checked her makeup and hair in the big mirror on the back wall and then stumbled on her high heels out of the bus to meet Lucy.

“Also, you will not be able to wear such a dress in this work and trust me, you will get many broken ankles in these,” Lucy pointed at her heels. Emily nodded. She actually had many comfy jeans and a collection of flip-flops and sneakers back at home. It just happened that she put on this outfit today.  
“Come on! Let's meet the boys. And do not worry, you look marvelous,” Lucy laughed when she saw Emily trying to straighten her dress and comb her short brown hair with fingers to look the best.

The hotel was small, but four-star place with a quiet lobby and a smiling receptionist by the desk. 

Lucy asked the lady to call all the rooms the boys were in and asked to send them down. Then she sat in a comfy rattan chair and invited Emily to sit next to her.

She sat down but remained sitting straight like she ate a ruler, that much nervous she was. She put her palms on her knees, constantly trying to pull her short skirt lower.

“Nervous?” giggled Lucy.

“Is it that so obvious?” Emily wiped her sweaty palms on her dress.

Lucy leaned forward. “When did you get to know New Kids?”

Emily thought for a minute. “Maybe when I was like 15 or so.” at that time, New kids were already out of their teenage years. She was around 20 when the youngest of them reached 25.

Lucy waved her hand “Do not worry, dear. They are just the same kids as they were like fifteen years ago.”

The problem was, that Emily stopped following the track of New Kids years ago, the only thing that remained were lovely songs in her mp3, and sweet memories of her childhood. New Kids broke up more than ten years ago and suddenly they announced they were getting back together.

“Oh here they are!” said Lucy, when she heard a door to the rooms opening and turned to look, then she tried to dig herself out of the comfy deep chair. Emily stood up like on a spring and turned to see her future companions.

There was a huge hustle at the door, since all five tried to enter with grace and almost everyone wanted to be at front of the group. So they all got stuck in the doorframe. Those who were smaller and less fightfull were squeezed in the back while the others tried to free their shoulders while swearing and mumbling.  
Finally someone in the back pushed the fighting ball of men forward, so they got untangled and entered the room with a bit of stagger and ballance catching and no grace at all.

Emily was nicely surprised. They were obviously older than the last time she saw them on the TV when she was a teenager, but they grew up with style.

First who emerged from that mixed ball of hands and heads was a tall guy with a hat put on sideways in pseudo-gangsta style that was just a part of a weird mixture of black gentleman jacket, colourful shirt, black evening pants and white sneakers.

“Here we go.” said Lucy and finally got up from the chair with a little bit of help provided by Emily. “So, guys, this is Emily, our new helper with production. Emily, this is...”

She did not finished, as the first guy already came closer and outstretched his hand for a shake. “Donnie. Donnie Wahlberg.” he said with tone that showed he is kinda over everything and the king of the situation. He had small browneyes with mischievous sparks in them. He was already starting to get a little chubby, but Emily knew, he was able to move and dance as hell.

The second guy behind Donnie pushed him away and almost fell on Emily, when Donnie stepped aside, that's how eagre he was to meet her.  
Two giant baby blue eyes focused on Emily, making her hitch in surprise. Those eyes belonged to Joey McIntyre, the youngling of NKOTB.

“Oh, HI!” he yelped and shook her hand in a rapid and quick move, almost tearing her hand out of the joint. “The name's Joey!” even when he was talking normally, he appeared to be screaming in excitement.

Joey had short, disheveled brown hair and a long white face with pointed chin. He was wearing green shirt and jeans, that was almost too big for his slim body. He watched her in awe and smiled so nicely like he never saw a more beautiful lady in his whole life. Emily blushed.

“Step aside, peasant!” bossed someone from behind and Joey quickly jumped to the side next to Donnie, whose role in the welcoming was finished so he stood there with hands behind his back, rocking back and front with a dorky smile settled on his face.

In front of Emily was now an elegant tall guy with movements of a panther. His leather jacket and black trousers only underlined his image. He had lascivious hazelnut eyes and smile in his perfectly shaved and smooth face that could make every girl lose her pants.  
Emily could not believe that Jordan aged so well. She remembered him with crazy bushy hair and giant eyes in his baby face. Now his black hair was neatly combed back and he finally grew up to the size of his eyes. Not like Joey, whose eyes got maybe even bigger as he was getting older.  
“Mylady. I am Jordan Knight. At your service.” Jordan picked her hand, turned it back up and kissed the top of it gently. His lips were smooth and hot. Emily was speechless.

“Well that was more than enough, ya Casanova, don't ya think?”  
Suddenly, two tanned muscular arms wrapped around Jordan´s slim waist, lifted him up and moved him aside like an unwanted sack of oats accompanied with many complaints from Jordan´s side.

Emily giggled at that scene. Jordan was so affected that his image was broken, he umbrage, not listening to his friend's laughing apologies.

The guy who lifted him up was Danny Wood. Emily remembered, that he was the shortest of the group. That feature remained, but he grew up the other way. He was so muscular, the black shirt he was wearing could use one or two sizes more. Also he gained one or more tattoos, as Emily noticed on his arms.  
He had sharp, almost square head with sharply cut jawline and huge smile with many small teeth. His dark eyes and corners of his mouth had wrinkles around them showing he loved to smile.  
He shook her hand gently, but hold her firmly “Pleasure to meet you. I am Daniel. Call me Danny.”  
Emily almost could not believe he had such deep and silky voice. She actually did not remember his singing voice from the music, but he had to be that deep rumble in the back of all the high pitch voices. He had the Boston southern accent deeper than other Kids.

Danny smirked when he noticed her watching him in awe and then he remembered he was not the last one in the line and while holding Emily´s hand, he looked back.  
“Where the heck is Jon?”

All Kids started to look around, then they noticed the missing member standing quietly behind Lucy, like he was hiding. The problem was, he was twice as tall as small old Lucy. He stood there, looking at the ground, his cheeks red.

“C´mon bro!” laughed Jordan and with Donnie´s help they practically pushed the last member to Emily. Danny led her closer to that poor scared fella.

“I am..well. Emily..nice to meet you,” she lifted her hand. 

Jonathan looked at her sheepishly, then slowly shook her hand. He said absolutely nothing.

Emily remembered him fantily, the same as Danny. They were both mostly the guys doing “the background” in all the videos she could remember.  
This scared tall guy was Jonathan Knight, Jordan's older brother and the oldest member of Kids. He had similar features as his sibling - small mouth and ebony black hair. Only his eyes were not hazelnut brown as his brother´s but they had a colour of grey-green like a forest pond. But in the opposite of his show-off brother, he did not use his nice look to woo the fangirls. There was a constant look of “scared deer in headlights” settled on his face, ready to run and hide.

He smiled at her. It was a shy but very nice smile. Emily made a note to herself to make this fella smile more and wider.

Lucy clapped, to get everyone’s attention. “Now that you know each other. We have a lot of work to do. There is recording tomorrow before the tour next month and also we must help Emily and show her around our daily routine.”

“I WILL SHOW HER AROUND!” screamed Joey and jumped up and down with his hand up like an overly excited preschooler. Donnie next to Joey calmed him down by patting the excited benjamin on the head. It somehow worked.

“Thank you Joey,” said Lucy, “But the first thing Emily has to do is to get back home, rest, and tomorrow come here to meet our manager and do some papers to become our official helper. Get rest, darling, and tomorrow come at eight. Our manager will be awaiting you here in the lobby,” said Lucy to her.  
Emily did not likd the idea of leaving those amazing dorky guys now that she met them, but she really wanted to get back home and change into a different clothes too. She swore to herself that this dress would not leave the wardrobe, until it was time to throw it out.

Emily gently said goodbye to all boys and Lucy, took her number in case of an emergency, and went home. There, in her tiny room, she faceplanted on the bed and screamed into the pillow.  
Who could think that running late to the work would end up so well?


	3. Taming the beasts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "If you have the courage to start, you have the courage to succeed."  
> \- Ralph Smart, writer

Emily showed up soon before eight in the morning. She was stepping in the lobby, waiting for the manager to meet her.  
She put on her favourite blue shirt, leggings and black balerines.

“Fancy to see ya that early in the morning,” a deep voice was heard behind her. 

Emily jumped in surprise. She almost forgot it was time for breakfast and the hotel guests were possibly nearby in some salon.  
There was Danny, looking at her with wide smile on his face, standing there with his hands folded behind his back. He had a white tank top on, that showed more of his tattoos. Now she was not wearing her overly high heels, she was actually smaller than him, looking somewhere at his nose.

“G...good morning!” Emily tried to smile, but her senses still tried to scream like a maniacal teenage girl upon seeing Danny or any other Kid. She swallowed to keep those crazy thoughts away.

“Waiting for Hugo? I mean our manager,” that sour face he made after he said the name, made Emily thought the manager was not as great as she hoped for.

“Is he that bad?”

Danny hissed. “Well that is not how I would describe him, no. But he can be a little - backstabbing. If ya know what I mean.”

“Oh, do not tell me he is that kind of a person that loves you at front but slander you when you turn away,” she whined.

“Exactly. So be aware of him. Just a friendly reminder,” he smirked and winked at her. Just that simple thing made her knees weaker. “Oh here he goes. See ya!” Danny saw the manager approaching them and quickly walked away.

The manager was a small slim guy, who more than a human, resembled a worm someone dug from under a rock, gave it a tie and a briefcase and sent it to work.  
He came to Emily with haughty smile on his face. “You must be Emily. Hello. I am Hugo Berhad,” he said briefly, shaking her hand. His palm was cold and his grip loose. Perfect opposite of a good manager, Emily thought.

They sat in the lobby and Hugo started his typical manager monologue of a good perspective in this company and many benefits it brings her, the young and naive girl, and giving her the opportunity to grow and blah blah blah.  
Emily listened only on half ear. She noticed Joey walking by, waving at her, but she only smiled. She did not want to disturb Hugo´s monologue. He might notice she was not listening to him and start the whole speech all over again and she was not risking that.

Finally he gave her the contract. “As you can see, since I have no experiences with you, only the good word of Lucy,” while saying her name, he made a face like Lucy is no relevant source at all for him. “So I am giving you month for training. During that we kinda get to know you and decide if we keep you or let you go,” he was so arrogant, Emily fought the urge to punch that pale face. It would possibly make a squishy sound as stepping on a fat snail. Emily quickly shook that ugly idea out of her head.

Finally the meeting was interrupted by Lucy, who hobbled in the lobby and picked Emily up.

“Thank god, no more of this please,” sighed Emily while stuffing the contract in her bag she carried on her shoulder.

“That is the exact thought of everyone that meet Hugo. But you’ll get used to him, I swear he is not as bad as he seems,” said Lucy, leading Emily outside to the parking lot.

There were two of the small busses. One was Lucy´s black transformer she lovely called Jacqueline. The second one was a normal white microbus for 8 people. Slowly, all five Kids with Hugo in the back got to the parking lot and got in the bus. Emily was invited to ride with them, but Lucy grasped her hand just before she made a step closer to the open door with five smiling faces in it, and dragged Emily to her own bus.

**********

They got to a recording studio, where Kids had prepared their whole day of recording a new song for their album.  
The room was cozy, covered in soundproof foams, filled with chairs, tables and deep comfy armchairs and sofas and one big mixing table. There was also a door to a small booth with window where was a stand for music sheets and a microphone.

Emily seated herself in the sofa, while Lucy went away with Hugo to discuss something. First next to Emily was Jordan.

“How is it going?” he asked softly. Emily shuddered. Donnie was the ladies men of the group, but this guy could woo even men to fell in love with him.

“Everything is so new for me. I just have to kinda let it settle in,” she smiled at him.

Joey seated his small butt on the other side of Emily. “And do you like this work with us?”

“What work?” she laughed.

Suddenly Lucy came and shoo both guys away to work. They had recording to attend to and the booth was ready for them already.  
“It will not be always just sitting around and talking, don´t you think that,” said Lucy, seating slowly next to her.

“I know that and I am ready to work. This is the dream come true,” said Emily happily.  
Donnie, Danny and Jon came in the room with some snacks. Lucy noticed her eyes shifted to those three and stayed focused on them.  
Danny turned around with some snacks in his arms and a bottles of water, came to the ladies at the sofa, gave both of them some of the sweets and each a bottle. When he handed the small flask to Emily, he smiled. Emily turned red as a beet, when he walked away and looked to the ground.

“Thankfully, I found someone who is happy to take this work after me and who, visibly, our guys like to have around,” smiled Lucy. Emily just nodded and hummed.  
She was so ashamed. She was still a little fangirl in her heart, tho she was trying so hard to be an adult and over it on the outside. She enjoyed the time with Jordan, Donnie or Jon and Joey´s shenanigans were so sweet, she did not take them that seriously.  
But when Danny only looked at her, she felt like her head was warming up and for some reason, she started to stutter.

Lucy just looked at her with a smile, knowing more than she was showing.

**********

The day was long and there was nothing much to do. The warmth of the room, cozy sofa and soft humming of Kids, who were not recording in the booth right now, was making her sleepy. She slowly drifted into the dream world with her head on the small sofa pillow.

She had a quite nice nap, when suddenly someone touched her shoulder gently. She woke up quickly, noticing that she really was asleep and she was so ashamed she did that. There was Donnie, standing above her with his backpack on his shoulder and one palm on her shoulder. “You all right? We are packing for tonight. If you want, I can carry you outside to the bus,” he smirked.

Emily quickly jumped to her feet. “I am fine, thank you. I can walk on my own,” she smiled quickly, gathered her stuff and followed Donnie out of the recording room. 

The recording went well for today. They finished the whole song and tomorrow was a dancing rehearsal before the tour next month

Emily was about to say goodnight for the day, but Lucy stopped her. “Do you need to go? How about you stay here with us? There will be a karaoke night at the hotel´s bar. You can sleep in the room with me, there is two beds in there. Or we can get you your own room if you want.”

She was shocked, but she realised being a personal help and production to the group, leads to some nice things, like living in a hotel with all of them and having a party at night.  
Of course she agreed! She also asked politely if she could have her own room. Nothing bad about Lucy, but this old little lady could be a little bit overwhelming after a short time.

When Kids got to the information that Emily is staying with them for the night, they could not hold their excitement, mostly Joey. He was jumping around like an excited frog and ended up jumping on Donnie’s back. Don had no idea this was coming and he struggled to gain balance again with such a heavy bag on his back.  
“To the karaoke bar we go!” commanded Joey and kicked Donnie with his heels like a horse. Donnie shook with him to calm him down, but he carried him halfway to the bar, before he became too tired and Joey dismounted.

Jon apologised to the group and went to the safety of his hotel room. He looked like not ready for a big party at all. Not even for a little one. Kids accepted it, but Emily was long looking behind, feeling sad for him.

The late evening was one hell of a blast full of laugh, dance, good singing, bad singing and mostly Lucy trying to sing even tho she had enough booze to kill a horse with and she had to be dragged to the podium by three Kids because she really wanted to sing and nobody had the heart to say no to her.  
Emily, after a good half an hour of being shy, had a few apple ciders and she already felt lightheaded and free to do anything. She even tried to sing. Thankfully, the bar had a huge stock of karaoke from 80’s to 90's boy bands so they found “You got it, the right stuff” from Kids and she swore to sing it.  
Since she did not want to sing alone, Donnie, already after a few good pints of beer, accompanied her.

For his and others surprise, Emily dug out of her memory most of the moves she learned from the original music video and made a fine performance that got a small standing ovation.

Jordan, while standing up, lost his balance and fell backwards over his chair. Danny and Joey started to laugh and wanted to help their friend back up, but Joey tripped over the fallen chair and fell on Jordan. When Danny saw that, he practically jumped on the pile too. Poor Jordan down there was gasping for air, while two grown up men were rolling on his stomach and laughing.  
Donnie could not stand to be left alone, he ran down from the stage and elbow-jumped on the pile. He probably hit Joey, because that poor fella yelped. The only thing that was visible from Jordan were his twitching legs.

The other hotel guests, sitting at the bar and still not that drunk to unconsciousness, were eyeing the pile of men with disgust and raised eyebrows.

“I think this was more than enough. To the beds, NOW!” said Lucy with her motherly voice. Even tho she was drunk like a sailor, she was somehow aware of the health and sleep of her Kids. She shooed Emily to bed too and she listened as a sheep.

*********

“That was fun!” laughed Joey, while walking to his room, bouncing from left wall to right one not able to walk straight. Donnie was dragging poor Jordan, who had so much booze and party he was just able to mutter. Also the recent men-pile did not add anything nice to him.

“I am glad you are with us here,” smiled Danny at Emily, while he was holding to the nearby door frame, trying desperately to shook the dizziness from his eyes.

Emily tried her best to stay calm, the booze did miracles with her confidence. “You know, guys that I was your big fan back then?” she hicced and quickly covered her mouth with her palm and giggled.

“Back then? You are no more?!” Donnie sounded insulted.

“I am still,” laughed Emily as she struggled to get to the door to her room. “You have no idea that this is the dream come true for me,” she pressed her back to the cool door, facing the four drunk men in the hallway.

Joey get his remaining strength and will and struggled to get to Emily. He almost fell on her face forward, but he stopped his fall with his hand on the door she was leaning onto. He practically caged her between his arms, body and the door. If Emily was not that drunk, she would think this was meant to be sensual.  
“You know I love you, do you?” said Joey, dorky smile on his face. His big blue eyes were hazy and half mast.

“Oh stop you!” giggled Emily and pushed Joey at the shoulder.

“Hey!” said Jordan suddenly, raising his head up, “I am the one, who is supposed to be the romantic one!” he mumbled and let his head to dangle again. He almost pulled Donnie down when he left his whole weight on him.

“Leave something for others,” Danny pushed himself from the opposite wall, fell on Joey and pulled him away from Emily. 

“There is enough for everyone,” said Donnie and leaned poor dizzy Jordan against the wall.

Emily giggled, “I feel like a teenager again,” she looked at all four guys around her, trying to mostly stay upwards.

“Hey!” yelped Joey and put a finger up like a schoolboy “Who is your favourite?” he managed to say before his tongue got twisted again.

“Not telling ya!” Emily stuck out her tongue at him.

“I bet it is Donnie!” said Joey and pointed at Don.

“Na-ah.” Emily shook her head, “Sorry darling, but you are at the bottom of my list.”

Surprisingly, Donnie took that information with laugh “I already knew I was not your type.”

“Well, one down, three to go,” said Joey, feeling like a Sherlock solving a crime.

“Four,” corrected him Jordan.

“I can't count Jon, can I?” he looked at Emily.

“Everybody loves Jon! He is the golden middle!” said Emily and leaned on the door frame more comfortably.

“That means another one is placed!” said Donnie, “Me the last and Jon in the middle.”

“Please tell me you like me and I am not the fourth!” pleaded Joey.

Emily´s face flushed red. Her reasonable left part of the brain was screaming to her to stop while she still can, but her hazy right lobe was so ready to get this to the end. “You are the second, darling,” she reached out and ruffled his hair.

“That leaves us with a hard question. First, or fourth?” Donnie looked at Jordan and Danny, the last two, who had no place on Emily´s liking list. Jordan, knowing he would be probably the top, straightened up and smiled.

“Well it is obvious, isn't it?” said Danny and pointed at Jordan, who did his best to look as seductively as his momentarily condition allowed him.

“You really have a low self esteem, don´t you, Danny?” said Emily with a smirk. This was a bad idea, but somehow she felt like she needed to say it. Danny was always her favourite and now, with her mind blinded by the booze, she felt like he needed to hear that.

“Who, me?” said Danny, visibly confused, then he realised what she meant and his face lit up with a flattered smile. There were not much ladies liking him, more so having him at the top of the favourites. And this was even better because he could not tore his eyes from Emily for the whole time since they met her.

“FOURTH?!” screamed Jordan.

Kids and Emily jumped from such a sudden noise.

“You say that I am fourth?!” he yelped again, absolutely furious.

Donnie pat him on the shoulder, “At least you are not the last, mate.”  
“Fourth,” spat Jordan again and bowed his back again, reaching for Donnie to lean onto. “That is worse than fifth. And I thought I could have any chance,” he mumbled.

“C´mon, you poor lovelorn, I get you to the bed and then you can cry your eyes out for Emily,” Donnie hold Jordan firmly and smiled at Emily.

“I am the second!” cheered Joey, “and I have only you to beat up to get to her,” he pointed at Danny, his eyes crossed and he almost fell into Danny's arms, suddenly unconscious from all that booze.

“I think it is time for all of us to go to bed,” said Danny. His cheeks were flushed red and he strictly avoided Emily´s sight.

“Noooo, I want to go with Emily! She loooves meee!” said Joey, but it was a soft scream because it was muffled by Danny´s shoulder he was leaning onto. Dan smiled at everyone and pushed Joey to his own room to make sure this little casanova would get some sleep.

“Do not take them seriously,” said Donnie silently and pointed at unconscious Jordan and at struggling Joey. “He is just a big baby and he loves everyone. He says what he thinks. Sometimes it is for his own detriment,” continued Donnie, “And Jordan,“ he looked at his pal to make sure he is dead enough for not listening to him, “he is just too much of a drunk casanova to ever admit that Danny won over him,” he smirked.

Emily waved her hand at that, “He will not remember it in the morning. None of us will,” she mumbled and got finally to her room, leaving Donnie to deal with poor ragdoll Jordan, who started to snore already.

This was one hell of a day and even bigger night. Emily fell on her bed in her clothing and drifted to sleep even before she touched the pillow.

**********

The morning after was full of headache. Emily woke up with sore throat and her legs hurt, probably from all that dancing on the stage. She struggled from the bed, somehow managed to get to the shower and get herself some cold water treatment.  
The cold water worked as a great reminder for her hazy mind. Suddenly, she opened her eyes under the water that was splashing on her head, and covered her mouth in shock. Did she really did what she thought she did last night?! She gasped for air and tried to think about it more.  
She definitely told them who is her favourite. And what if? They will not make anything from it and Danny is obviously not into her, she knew that as a fact. She remembered the time she got to know that Danny actually dated famous Halle Berry, the brown mystical beauty of the 90's. Emily was like a potato compared to her, with her casual face, hair that were definitely not made by L´oreal and a full body with wide hips. The only think she liked and proudly shown were her C cups.  
No way she would be anyone's favourite, altho Joey´s cute flirting made her blush and feel pretty all the time.

**********

When she came out of her room, she met Jordan and Danny in the hallway. She halted right behind the door, her heart suddenly pounding in her chest.  
Jordan had to have a rough night, since he was sheet white and his eyes were bloodshot.  
Danny was supporting his fellow bandmate by holding him by shoulders and guiding him through the hall. He too looked like he had a sleepless night, his eyes were half closed. He had the same t-shirt and trousers he wore yesterday so he probably had no time to change or wash.

“What is going on?” asked Emily silently. Her head hurt like hell and any louder noise made her to close her eyes in pain. She felt her cheeks burning and she hated herself for it. It was just a casual morning after drinking, nothing too uncommon.

Danny noticed her and tho tired, he managed to smile sweetly, “Jordan had a eety-beety alcohol poisoning yesterday, so we took care of him all night. Now we want to try to eat something.”

Emily looked at poor Jordan. While they stopped to talk with Emily, he leaned on the wall, too tired and weak to stand for a long time. His raven black hair were matte and pointing to all directions, his handsome face drooped. 

She joined them for the breakfast. She even tried to help Danny with dragging Jordan, but he refused. “Lady is not supposed to drag anything heavy, let me manage,” then he shuffled Jordan's hand over his shoulders and led him to the breakfast saloon. Emily felt flattered at that nice gesture. Jordan was trying to talk, but he only moaned, probably counting the seconds to another stomach turn-up.

Joey, Donnie and Jon were there already. Joey looked well rested and his blue eyes shined in the morning light coming inside through long windows. Donnie was hiding his face behind a giant steaming cup of coffee, not talking till he got his morning dose of caffeine into the system.  
Jon sat beside him with scrambled eggs on the plate and no problems at all.

Danny sat Jordan to their table and turned to the buffet table to fetch some breakfast. “You want anything?” he asked Emily.

“That is ok, Danny, I am not that hungry,” her stomach was rumbling from hunger, but she knew that if she gave it anything, she would see it again in no time.

Danny frowned, “You say what you want, I get it for you,” then he casually pulled a free chair for her to sit on.

Emily was really flattered. She never got treated so nicely and she had the urge to do everything herself. She sat her confused butt on the chair and got even more surprised, when Danny pushed the chair with her to the table. “Well?” he leaned to her.

“You need to eat something,” said Jon, “if nothing, at least you will have something to throw up instead of just stomach acid.”

“Ehm, that is gross,” said Emily.

“But true,” answered Jon and picked up fresh newspapers.

She looked up at waiting Danny. He was not looking angry, just determined. Then she noticed what Jon had on his plate. “How about scrambled eggs and….a cup of unsweetened tea?” it was a sincere question and probably the only thing she could eat for now. She thought that if she had to turn her stomach inside out, at least scrambled eggs would be the easiest to throw out.

Danny hummed and left for the buffet.

She looked around, noticing some gigglings. Her eyes ended on Donnie, whose face quickly hid behind the mug. “What's so funny?” she asked and frowned.

“Do not ever try to argue with Danny. He has his own head and he is an incurable gentleman,“said Jordan silently, his voice cracked.  
“Also, he kinda likes you,” whispered Joey like it was the best secret he ever heard.

Jon probably heard this news for the first time, because he almost choked on his scrambled eggs. Donnie, sitting next to him, gave him a few good hits to the back. Jordan, who was sitting with his hands in his lap, managed to squeeze out a tiny smile.

Emily turned flushing red. She looked to the buffet table, where Danny was already picking up the plates with food for Jordan, her and himself. She hoped that mountain of food was mostly for his need and not for herself and Jordan, who looked like he could turn out everything denser than water.  
No way this guy is actually liking her. Of course, she was their new helper and they were all sweet and caring, but she couldn’t point out any tiny details of chilvarity. They all cared for her like of a princess even tho they knew her only a few days.

Danny came back and the giggling at the table stopped. Jon stuffed his cheeks with food, Donnie lowered on the chair and grasped his mug like a life buoy. Jordan could do nothing but sit there, awaiting his probably slow and painful death from booze poisoning. Only Joey was sitting there, beaming with happiness so much, Emily played with a thought that if they pushed him on the hotel balcony, Rohan would answer the call of Gondor in need.

Jordan got his plate of scrambled eggs, dry toast and unsweetened tea and he looked at it desperately with his head between his shoulders. Emily got not only the plate she ordered, practically the same as Jordan´s portion, but she got seemingly most of the food that was displayed on the buffet. A piece of everything that Danny managed to pick up  
Danny sat himself on the other side of Jordan and put down everything else he was holding. Emily was puzzled if he would be able to eat everything he bought for himself, but he was probably starving through the night on the guard by Jordan´s bed.

They ate in silence, sometimes disturbed by Jordan´s gurgling noises when he tried his best not to puke everything out again. Those sounds made Emily and even Donnie hurl up too, but they both managed to hold it in. Danny cared for Jordan as for his own kid, but when he tried to spoon feed him, he was pushed away. Jordan was ill and in a bad condition, but not THAT bad!

**********

Lucy got up later in the morning. She was grumpy. Hugo was nowhere to be seen. According to her, that lizard was not sleeping at all and he was probably already somewhere important to discuss important stuff with even more important people.

Today was a dancing rehearsal. Jordan was excused from it, but he insisted on being at least there to watch the steps. After the breakfast he felt much better.  
Lucy was not able to go with them to the dancing studio since she had so much work with getting Kids their new tour bus and she had to go pick one and get it modified to their needs.

“You are sending me there alone?!” Emily was shocked. She was not ready to be alone with them and in charge of everything so soon!

Lucy patted her on the cheek with her soft palm, “You are a grown up lady and now my assistant, you already got their hearts so I believe you will have no problems with them. There will be nothing to do, just sit there and enjoy the view,” she smirked and winked. “Also if you need anything or something like broken ankles happens, or Hugo arrives, just call me and I will help you. Easy.”

So happened that Emily was squeezed between Donnie and Jon on the back seat of the minibus and transported to the dancing studio. She felt deserted by Lucy and she had no idea what to do.

There was a lady dancing coordinator ready for them and she put them to work immediately, they knew the usuals. Emily was standing in the doorway of the big hall for a minute, then she decided to seat herself on one of the benches and just watch the show around her. 

The steps were not that hard to learn, but the drill the coordinator put on Kids was intense. Jordan did his best to show some participation in the dancing, probably to please their beautiful dancing coordinator, but he soon became weak and had to lay near Emily on the free bench. She was searching the internet on her phone, when a white shirt landed next to her feet. She fearfully looked up and her eyes widened.  
Donnie was shirtless, running around to chill himself down a little funky way. He had a bit chubby body, but nothing that bad, he still had lovely muscles and a slim waist. Some ladies who were training with them as their workout for the tour, blushed and laughed. The coordinator just stood there, hand on her forehead and shaking her head in disbelief he did it again. Emily noticed she looked a bit red in the cheeks.

“I am the king of the wooorld!” screamed Donnie and jumped on Joey, to kinda pay back the piggy ride he gave him yesterday. Sadly, Joey was so surprised, he did not expected this to happen, his knees broke under him and they both fell on the ground. Donnie jumped up like on a spring and ran to Danny, leaving Joey laying on the stomach, confused.  
Danny stood sideways, outstretched his arms forward and raised one knee up to protect himself and to keep that running half naked maniac away, but Donnie tried to fight him and tucked on his shirt. “C´mon bro, fite me!” laughed Don accompanied with Danny´s giggling.  
It was such a sweet sound, Emily looked up to see who was doing that. Even tho Danny´s voice was deep and rumbly while singing or talking, his laugh was higher and so sincere and cute, Emily got goosebumps.

“This will be all you running around without your clothes on the whole tour,” snicker Danny.  
Donnie managed to grip his friend´s shirt and raised it up his belly, stripping poor Dan without his agreement. He did his best to put his shirt back down and push the annoying companion away.  
Emily noticed a tattoo on Danny´s lower stomach with wings and name Elisabeth. She felt a sting in her heart and she quickly looked at her phone. Jordan, lying next to her, noticed that change in her behaviour and quickly gathered all the information. “It's nice of him to have a name of his beloved mother on his body, isn't it?” he mumbled silently, like for himself, but loud enough for Emily to hear.  
Emily only murmured in agreement, thanking him silently that he explained. It was really a long time she last watched New Kids stuff before she met them and she totally missed that Danny added some more tattoos on his body during that time.

Finally Donnie got bored of the fight and let Dan pull the shirt back down.

“Thank god you let him be, Donnie,” said Joey while sitting on the floor, where he was pushed before, “You have to think about the ladies here. We all know you are in a good shape, but do not take me wrong - Danny is in a better one.”

Donnie took umbrage at that comment. It was a sad true he did not like to hear. He went to Emily to pick up his shirt and got back to his position in the group for the next dancing lesson. He looked like an angry kid, who just got schooled.

Danny pulled his shirt down as down as he could and then he tucked it into his trousers, looking all around to make sure nobody was making fun of him. He noticed Emily looking at him. When their eyes met, she quickly looked down to her phone, trying to look occupied.

***********

The rest of the day went without incidents. Emily wrote Lucy that everything was ok and that they were going out for a walk. Jordan needed some fresh air and others were so hyped after the workout, the best thing for running the adrenaline down, was to slowly walk it off.

They took Emily on a long walk around the coasts.  
She set her face to the warm salty breeze coming from the sea. After hours in the building doing almost nothing she was happy to finally stretch and get some energy. She started humming the new song from Kids. She spent hours listening to it yesterday in the recording room. “Summertime” was so nice and sexy song, she started to bob her body left and right while walking between Joey and Jordan.

They all stopped talking to each other. Donnie in front of them set aside his phone he was searching on, and looked back. Jon and Danny, walking behind them, halted.

Emily woke up from daydreaming, noticing the group was looking at her, standing around like five towers. “What?” she asked shyly.

“You have a nice singing voice,” smiled Joey and in his voice was heard a sheer admiration.  
“Those were some moves you got there.” Jordan winked at her.

“It's nothing,” peony was less red than she was right now.

“You seems to like our new song,” added Donnie.

“It is a nice song I must say. All I see while thinking about it, is beach, water, warm breeze and a shining sun,” she hummed happily.

Donnie looked at the sea and thought for a second. Then he turned at the group, “Guys, I have been thinking about the set of our new clip for a long time and Emily just gave me an idea. Summertime is about, well, summer, right?” others nodded. Donnie turned to the beach under the sidewalk they were on. “ How about here?” he outstretched his hands to encompass the whole beach in front of them with the beautiful orange sun setting in the emerald waves.

Others looked over the sea. “That sounds promising,” said Danny.

“All we need is few ladies to sing to,” added Jordan, rubbing his chin, deep in dreaming.

Joey frowned at him and hugged Emily around shoulders, “We already have one and she is amazing! Are you not satisfied with it?!” he protected their young production lady with his own arms.  
Emily giggled and held onto his slim but firm arms as he swayed her gently from left to right. He was so emotional and jokefull and he loved to show it anytime. She gave him a soft peck on the cheek and Joey´s eyes widened. “With this, I will be the number one in no time!” he laughed.

“Slow down the pace, you can get seriously hurt.” Jordan patted Joey on the shoulder and he let Emily go. He too noticed Danny behind them clenching his fists.

“I will call Hugo, he will help us to get everything set,“Donnie picked up his phone again and go to call the manager. The others continued to slowly walk around the beach, while Donnie was left behind, describing everything to Hugo.

“You have to go on the video recording with us too,” smiled Joey.

“On the beach?” Emily frowned.

The others looked at her with worries. “What's going on? You do not like the beach?” asked Jordan.

“I do. But…” she stopped for a second, “I am kinda scared of deep water, so I do not go to the deep parts of the sea much,” she mumbled. “Also I do not have anything to wear on the beach. I left all of my stuff by my parents in their home when I moved.”

“Jon can help you buy something!” laughed Danny and hit Jon friendly to the back. Jon almost fell forward how hard the hit was.

Emily turned to the silent member. “You can? I would like to have something nice but I have no time to shop and my style is horrible,” she flashed her eyelashes at him.

Jonathan was silent. His face was pale but his eyes were shining. Finally he opened his mouth to answer, “I can do it. Perhaps. I would like to help. Yes, let's do this!” he decided.  
Emily was speechless. She heard Jon talking for the first time. Most of the time she was with them, he was silent as a fish or said one short sentence. He had so nice and crispy voice it almost did not suit such a quiet and shy guy.

“Then it's on. Tomorrow is a shopping day!” yelped Joey.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for the kudos and if you like it, you can leave a comment, it makes my day a bit brighter :-)


	4. Getting to know each other

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I have no friends, I have a family.”  
> \- Dominic Toretto

Emily and Jon left the hotel early in the morning. The evening was calm. Everyone went to bed early, because they were sore from all the dancing and walking.

Jon was smiling at her, when they met outside the hotel. He looked like a completely different person. The shyness was gone, and there was a confident and happy looking guy standing in front of her instead.

“So, where are we off to?” Emily was pleasantly surprised of that change, but she was still unsure how to react and talk to him. She did not want to send him back to the shyness and silence.

“I know a few nice shops in the mall nearby. We can go there and get you some swimming suit and some summertime clothes,” he measured her from head to toes, probably thinking of what could suit her the best. Then he grasped her hand and led her through the streets. 

Emily was holding hands with him for the whole walk to the mall. She felt like some people were looking at them and even turning their heads, when they got past them. Her cheeks were red, but she was with no ugly guy at all. Jon was walking like the world belonged to him, his raven black hair neatly combed back, similar to his brother's style, his light grey coat patting in the wind. He even did not mind, when Emily held closer to him and hugged his arm, when they had to push through the crowd waiting for the tram near the mall.

Jon took her to the first shop he saw and immediately went to ladies section. He let her hand go and started picking up one swimming suit after another, measuring their colour and size with Emily.  
She was just standing there and letting him do the magic. He was really good in fashion, because everything he picked as good for her to try on in the dressing room, was everything she admit would suit her.

While Emily went to the changing room, Jon sat himself with a few pieces of the clothings on the sofa outside, and waited for her to show him the results.

She tried a few swimming suits on. She was slim in waist, but her chest and butt were bigger and she was always ashamed of those parts. Jon picked one one-piece swimming suit with two flaps, that were meant to be tied behind neck and they formed the bra with deep V cleavage. It was really sexy, tho Jon did not like it and sent her to change into something else.

After a few swimming suits, that Emily or Jon did not like, they settled on two-piece swimming suit with higher waist to hide and support her buttocks and the top that not only had her correct breast size, but when she jumped, her ladie´s advantages did not fall out of it.  
It happened once, when she tried on some bikini type bra and jumped a little, making her breast to fall out of the tiny piece of clothing. To her surprise, Jon was left cold as ice while she turned red as a beet and ran to hide in the dressing room with her hands on her chest.

“Off to dresses I see,” said Jon, obviously living his dream, and ran to the dresses by himself. He left Emily there alone in the dressing cabinet, packing the blue swimming suit they both agreed on.

**********

They spent the whole morning and early afternoon in the mall. When they both got hungry, they stopped at the fast food to get some treat for themselves.  
Jon was carrying five bags full of summer clothings for her and even one for himself. He just had to buy those sweet looking shirts and Emily supported him completely. He even gave her a little exhibition, when he took his own coat and shirt off to try one of those shirts on.  
She saw only his bare back, when he politely turned away from her, but his arms were muscular and hips slim. She had no idea why he was so shy all the time, if he is hiding such a nice voice, lovely eyes, knee-weakening smile and a fine body.

“This was so much fun,” said Jon with his mouth full of the fast food burger.  
Emily could not answer, she was just biting in her own burger, so she only lifted her thumb up.  
“Guys will love you in those clothes. Especially Joey will eat you alive, if you put on that blue flower headband we bought before,” he laughed.

“I am not into Joey, thanks,” she answered jokingly.

“Me neither,” answered Jon. Then he realised what he said and turned pale.

Emily stopped chewing. Then she got it as a joke and smiled. “Who do you like, then?”

“Harley is kinda a fine guy,” he said without thinking.

She choked on the piece she had in mouth “You are not joking. For real?”

Jon realised she thought it was just a funny joke, and his cheekbones flushed red. He fell back into the silence and hid his head between his shoulders.

Emily quickly gulped, what she had in her mouth, left the burger on the tray and pulled her chair closer to Jon, who again looked miserable and diffident.  
“There is nothing bad about you having crush on another guy. Do you like him for a long time?” she put her arm gently around his shoulders.

Jon’s back muscles went stiff. He nodded.

“Who is he exactly?” she asked, sincere interest in her voice.  
Jon lifted his head a little to look at her face. When he noticed, she was not going to make fun of him or even be disgusted, he smiled. “He is an actor, Harley Rodriguez,” he said that name as it was the sweetest thing he ever heard. “We met at the gym one day, he was the instructor there and I kinda fell for him,” he mumbled the last sentence.

Emily pat him on the shoulder: “Do you think he likes you too?” she asked with a smirk.

Now Jon´s cheeks turned bright red. “Maybe. Who knows. Probably not. I am not his type.”

“You are a handsome guy! Do not tell me some Rodriguez do not like such a romantic, sweet, sexy and loving guy like you!?” she got so fired up, Jon actually lifted his head and his confidence grew a little, “You just have to get to him and ask him if he want´s to go out with you. If he does, you can continue to date him perhaps. If not, you would at least know how are you standing with your relationship,” her voice was getting faster and louder, before Jon shushed her.

“There is still a little problem in this plan,” said Jon, “I have something called social anxiety. I can't just go and talk to someone. Especially if I feel for them. The stress is killing me all the time. It took me few days just to talk to you.”

Emily sat there with her mouth forming O. So that's why he was so silent, standing behind others and always looking to the ground!  
She remembered he was doing that year ago when she saw the live videos on TV. That poor fella was silently suffering from anxiety, stress and who knows what more and now she get to know he was also secretly gay. “Does others, you know, the Kids, know about your feelings?”

Jon shook his head.

“Not even Jordan?” she widened her eyes at him.

“Especially not Jordan! Donnie is suspecting something tho. Do you also have some crush?” he asked quickly.

Now the tables turned and Emily flushed red.

Jon sat closer to her, suddenly interested in her behaviour. “Let me guess - Danny.”

The silence following that simple sentence was more than enough for an answer. 

“Worry not. I am not the type who will tell everyone. I keep it for myself,” he winked and Emily smiled at him. “So your top list was not just made up, I see,” added Jon.

“They told you about that stupid list they made me say?” she whimpered.

“Every little detail,” he nodded.  
Emily hid her face. So they all remembered her embarrassing drunk declaration.

Jon watched her for a minute with a sincere joy, “He actually thinks he has some chance with you,” he said.

“Who has?”

“Danny, of course,” Jon giggled.

Emily howled in embarrassment. When she calmed down a bit, she looked at Jon and smiled. She had no idea her now best friend will be the shyest one of the whole group.  
“I would not tell anyone about your problems and your sweet little secret, and you do no tell mine. You let me figure this love problem by myself. Pinkie promise?” she raised her right pinkie.

“Yeah, pinkie promise,” giggled Jon, raised his little finger and touched hers, “Now let's go back and show your new garderobe,” Jon jumped from his chair, picked up the bags and led Emily out of the mall back to the hotel. 

They were laughing and chatting all the way back.

“Also,” said Emily on their way home, “I think Joey just lost his privilege of being number two on the list.”

She made Jon laugh so loudly the people were turning at them in disbelief. She so loved hearing him laughing.

**********

“Someone is in a good mood,” welcomed them Donnie by the door to the lobby. He was just having a cigarette out there, when he saw those two coming.  
Emily and Jon quickly shut up and ran around him, giggling like two teenage besties, holding hands and retrieving quickly up to the room to try on the best clothes they bought.

They almost ran over Joey and Danny in the hallway. Joey wanted to join the hype train, but Emily shoo him away, “This is only between us two,” she laughed and dragged Jon to her room. They closed the door with a slam that silenced their joyfull giggling.  
Danny was murmuring something and Joey tried his best to keep distance from him. He looked dangerous.

**********

Two days later, which were filled with dancing rehearsals and recording music, Donnie came to the dining table with news. Hugo and him managed to get the recording stuff, people and place for their “Summertime” video!  
“Tomorrow is beach recording and the day after is dance recording on the stage and in the bar. I managed to get tons of lovely ladies to accompany us there,” he winked.

Jon was not happy about the last part.  
When Joey heard about ladies, he hugged Emily to let her know she was still the best one. She giggled and patted him on the cheek.  
Jon probably leaked the information that Joey´s number two chair on Emily´s priority chart is wriggling under him, because Joey was incredibly sweet and lovable for the past few days. Not that Emily did not like that she was pampered from everyone, except Jordan, who was probably still grumpy about his classification.

“Time to put on some lovely summer clothes,” whispered Jon, when they were leaving the dinner to get ready for tomorrow, “Get your beauty sleep,” he smiled, when they parted for the night and went both to their rooms.

“They are just friends,” Donnie tried to say to Danny, when the remaining four Kids were standing in the hall, watching those two acting like lovebirds.  
Danny noticed the info was meant to him, he pushed Donnie to stop him from talking and looking at him with a all knowing smile, and went to his own room.

**********

Hugo woke up everyone early in the morning. Donnie was occupied with waking up Jordan, who was the real sleeping beauty and after someone finally woke him up, he could be angry and annoyed.  
It was only six in the morning, when Jon knocked on Emily's room and he was quickly let in. Joey wanted to go in too, but as soon as he entered the room and closed the door behind him, they opened again and four strict hands pushed him back to the hall even tho he tried to brake with his heels.

The four Kids were waiting downstairs for their friends and talking to each other. All of them had some summer clothings on.  
Joey was in grey-blue t-shirt with long sleeves and light shorts. Danny had only grey vest, shorts and sneakers.  
Donnie was all in white with open shirt, long trousers and white flip-flops. He had a cool sunglasses on and he was proud of them.  
Jordan was the only one who was wearing more than three pieces. He had white tank top, long comfy grey pants and dark blue hoodie. He still looked like he someone just kicked him out of bed, arms pushed in the pockets of his hoodie and sour face on.

The talking was quickly cut short, when Donnie started hitting everyone to get their attention and pointing at the door to the hallway.  
Jonathan was wearing his new colorful shirt with long sleeves and skin toned shorts. His hair lost all class from before and they were playfully disheveled and falling into his green eyes in black curls. 

Emily was holding him by arm. She somehow managed to colour her hair during the evening so now her previously brown short hair were shining like a copper and they were fluffy and gently waving around her right eye, around ears and to her shoulders. Only those that were seen from under her new white summer hat with long brim. She had lovely light blue dress that was half see through in the light, showing she had a dark blue swimming suit under it. She had brown roman style shoes on.

“Mother of god,” sighed Jordan.

Donnie took off his sunglasses.

"Morning," said Emily shyly, clasping Jon´s hand like a life buoy.

“YOU LOOK LIKE AN ANGEL!” screamed Joey the thoughts of all of them. He got hits and a few slaps from Kids and a giggle from Emily.

They got out to the parking lot, where Hugo was waiting for them with the minibus. Danny was the last in the group. 

Joey noticed him and slowed down to get to him. “Isn't she lovely?” he teased.

“You shut your mouth or I wash it with soap,” he mumbled.

“Go there and tell her, you said nothing since they came,” tried Joey again, not noticing the angry sting in Danny´s voice.

“I just admire from afar, thanks,” he pushed Joey a little to show him, that he did not want to talk more. Joey shrugged and ran to join the others.

The truth was, Danny had no words to say. Her beauty left him speechless.


	5. Summer Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “This way of summer made me somewhat unhappy."  
> \- Vladislav Vančura

The ride to the beach was short and when they got out of the bus, they saw at least five people from the crew, their dancing cooperator and five lovely ladies there. They had bikinis on and looked like they fell straight out of a magazine. Andy, that lovely lady in the middle of them, wearing a tight bikini on her perfect slim body, was one of the few ladies Emily knew and befriended.  
They both met at the dancing studio a few times, but it took time for them to talk together and actually introduce properly. From that time, Emily enjoyed the time with Andy while also envying her perfect body measurements and dancing skills. She danced like a fairy on the top of a daisy, while Emily was there, trying her best but still ending dancing like a donkey in between the thistles.

She watched the swarm of lovely ladies, showing their perfect danced up bodies in their fitting outfits.Emily felt fat and ugly next to them.

“I don't like them either,” mumbled Jon to encourage her.

The director went to the Kids to say hello. 

Donnie unbuttoned his shirt and let it fly freely around his hips.  
Danny was commanded to take his vest off. He hesitated, but then he listened, took it off and kicked his sneakers to the sand, walking barefoot in the hot sand.  
Emily secretly admired him from the other side of the beach.  
He was tanned, had a big tattoo on his back, one on his stomach and another one on each sides of his arms. There was a dragon tattoo placed on his left peck. When he stretched, the tattoos looked like they came to life. Jon, still standing by her side, had to hit her gently to the back to remind her to breathe again.

Emily laughed nervously at Jon and separated from him, when she saw a big parasol with a blanket nearby. She walked to it and sat in the cool shadow and played with her phone. She had no taste for walking around the lovely ladies. Not after she saw they were here just to do some “background” for the singing Kids on the camera.

The ladies were separated one for each member. Then they all took turns in front of the camera while singing to a Summertime on the recording. Emily and Jon shared a few looks, when Jon had to sing with the lady seductively hugging him. When the camera was off, he looked at her with “help me” wrote all around his face. Emily just waved at him and smiled to let him know she knew his suffering.

Donnie was the ladies man, so he teased his lady, pinched her butt and ran with her in the sand. Joey tried to start a conversation with his blonde lady, but soon realised she had nice body but no brain. Danny just stood there, hands deep in his trousers pockets. When his lady tried to touch him out of the camera, he stepped aside.  
Jordan was now on the spot of the camera operator, so he did his best to seduce his perfect woman, who was moving around him like a snake. Emily noticed their dancing director lady’s jaw stiffened when she was watching Donnie and Jordan on the scene.

**********

The recording took a few reruns and tests, but just after a few hours it was done. Kids were all sweaty and tired. The sun was up in the sky trying to cook their bodies in its heat.  
Joey, like he was, in his shorts, shirt and sneakers, ran to the ocean as soon as the director said “CUT!”

Donnie took his shirt off immediately and ran to the waves too to cool his overheating body, followed by Jordan, who was hopping on one leg, because he couldn't took one of his shoes off. Jon and Danny looked at each other, not sure what to do now.  
They both looked up the beach to Emily sitting there in her lonesome, waiting for some company, and then down to the Kids who were acting like real kids in the water. Danny made a step up, but Jon was quicker and decided to go up to the parasol first. Danny turned to the sea and went to the water. Andy, their dance director, joined him and they pushed each other playfully.

The ladies got further away under another parasol to keep themselves in a shadow. The recording crew left to prepare the next filming area for tomorrow.  
Jon sat next to Emily in the shadow of her parasol. Then he noticed her staring directly in front of her, not blinking, a bit of rage seeping from her gaze. He followed her sight to end up on Danny and Andy, pushing each other in the shallow waters.  
“If you stare long enough, you will actually burn your name into his back,” he said after a minute of silence.

Emily blinked and looked away, blushing, “I am just watching them having fun.”

“Then have fun with them too, don't you? You should get to the water, what we bought the swimming suit for?”

Emily giggled nervously: “I think I am not the right person to show her body when such a perfect ladies were here a minute ago.”

“Hey!” said Jon and put a calming hand on her shoulder: “I am the one who is supposed to be anxious here! You go there and enjoy some time in the summer. I would probably stay here in the shadow where I feel better.”

Emily had no time to think about it. Donnie noticed those two under the parasol, secretly talking to each other, and then focused on Danny, playfully drowning Andy and giggling. He decided to break this spell and put one and one together. He ran from the water, got to the parasol, picked up Emily who began screaming and kicking, brought her to the sea like a sack of oats, thrown over his shoulder.

“DONALD EDMOND FUCKING WAHLBERG! Put me down immediately!” screamed Emily, punching him to the back.

“As you wish, my lady,” he then force threw her into the deeper water. She had only time to yelp before the water closed over her head.

Emily raised above the water like a wet mouse just a seconds after. Her dress was ruined, sticking to her, the beautiful hair messed up.  
Joey ran to her to help, remembering she hated deep water, but she shook him off and angrily walked out of the water, stomping around Kids in her wet romanian shoes. Kids just stood there, frozen in fear, trying not to look her in the eye. Jordan stepped in front of Andy in a silent protection. She slowly backed from the water and went back to her dancers, this was a landmine area and she wanted to be as far as possible from it.  
During that walk out of the water, Emily tore the broken and soaking wet hat from her head and dragged it behind her like a dead fish. Her feet were making wet splashing sounds as she got out from the water and headed back to the parasol.

“Well that was worth a try,” said Donnie, when she stormed around him.

“She is gonna kill you, Don,” said Jordan, watching Emily leaving.

“Naaah, she is cool with that,” laughed Donnie and waved his hand.

“No, Don, she IS going to kill you,” Jordan stepped aside just to be sure.

Emily got back up to the parasol as Jordan was talking, kicked her shoes off and threw away the dress, showing her new blue swimming suit. Then she stretched, turned back down and ran at full speed back to the sea, catching the speed as she went.  
“ONGUARD!” she called as she crashed shoulder first to Donnie´s back, throwing herself and him back into the water.

Joey went crazy and jumped for them to save one or another, didn't matter which one, but Donnie mistaken him as Emily and tried to drown him.  
Emily was underwater for too long and she forgot to hold her nose and it already filled with salty water, making her go crazy with fear.  
Suddenly, an arm wrapped around her waist and pulled her out of the water. She was so scared of drowning, she tried to crawl on the person who picked her up.

“Calm down I am holding ya alright!” giggled Danny in her ear as she tried to scratch her way on his head, away from the water.

“She tried to drown me!” Donnie raised from water, holding Joey around neck, strangling him. Joey was kicking around and trying his best to bite him in the arm.

“You attacked me first!” hissed Emily.

Danny did his best to hold Emily above the water tho she was wiggling. He managed to put his forearm under her butt and he raised her up more to get her feet from the water.

“This means war!” screamed Donnie and splashed Emily with water. She tried desperately to get away from that wave, holding Danny around the neck like he was the only thing that kept her alive.

“I am with Emily!” spat Joey the salty water, when he finally got back on the air, but Donnie pushed his head back down.

“I call the fight in the water!” announced Jordan.

Danny and Emily looked at each other. Emily finally realised, who she was holding all that time and quickly let go of him, jumping in the water that was up to her breast.

Donnie pulled Joey from the water and declared him to be their judge, then he swam to Jordan and with many problems and curses, picked the lighter friend on his broad shoulders.

“They stand no chance against us,” smiled Danny mischievously, took a deep breath and disappeared underwater. Before Emily could say or do anything, she was raised from the water into quite a height. She almost fell backwards, but Danny was holding her legs firmly on his chest and helped her to gain back her ballance.

“LET THE FIGHT BEGIN!” screamed Joey like he was on a horse race and started to comment it like a real fight.  
“Yes ladies and gentlemen! Welcome to the annual water fight with New Kids. We have a few adjustings to the situation. Emily is not ready but Jordan is already on his way to toss her out into the depths of the deep deep ocean buuuuuuut Danny reacted and pushed Donnie with his elbow! Oh ladies and gentlemen this is the fight of the millenia! Emily finally regained some strength and started pushing Jordan. And faul! Dear viewers, Jordan touched the boob! I repeat, Jordan touched the boob! Let's see that from the record.”

“JOEY!!!!” screamed four voices in unisono, making the named to almost gulp his own tongue, but he was quickly back on track when they continued to fight.

“The actors are already mad at the announcer, but that is nothing to worry about, dear viewers, the fight continues! Jordan was stunned by the sudden touch of the forbidden fruit and he was almost tossed off Donne´s back, but ladies, we have a strong handsome guy here. Donnie was able to keep Jordan on his back only by holding onto his legs!  
A quick discuss of a plan between Emily and Danny, this will be interesting, dear viewers! Aaaand Donnie is charging! Donnie is charging! And they crashed into each other! Those four people grasped in a firm grip. Who is going down? Whose strength is lower?  
Oh ladies and gentlemen this was unexpected. On the given signal, both Danny and Emily let go of their foes! Donnie and Jordan are going down!!!! EMILY AND DANNY WON!!!”  
Joey was jumping in the water and screaming and cheering.

Emily was out of her breath, but she was laughing. Danny let her down as gently as he could, leaving some time for her to hold her nose, then letting her fall backwards into the water.

Joey ran to the winners and jumped on Danny who huffed and straddle to keep such a heavy friend up. Emily was still lighter than excited Joey. “I did not signed any contract to be the life buoy today, guys,” giggled Danny, as he tossed his friend back into the water.

Donnie did not accepted their failure, but after Emily hugged him, he kinda forgave her. When Danny tried to hug him, Donnie ran as far as he could in the water. Jordan umbrage, but he too was lightly convinced by Emily´s hug from behind.

They all chased each other in the water for a few good minutes, before they became tired of the running and laughing. Emily ran to Jon who was peacefully sitting in the shadow and hugged him, to cool him down too. He hissed when her cold wet body touched him.

“I saw everything,” he whispered, “You two look gorgeous together,”  
Emily slapped him on his shoulder “Stop it!” she giggled.

Her dress was completely dry when she picked it up, so she could at least have something on after shaking the sand off. Other Kids were not that lucky. Donnie and Danny had shirt and vest dry, Jordan had his tank top but their bottoms were soaking wet. Joey was wet as a mouse without nothing to change into but that did not stop him from grinning from ear to ear as he was dripping wet.

**********

The travel home was the funniest Emily ever had. The driver of their minibus wanted no wet seats, so he took only Jon. Emily could go too, but she decided to walk to the hotel with others.  
Joey was holding her hand the whole walk like a little excited kid. Donnie tried to get to her other side, but she was quicker and outstretched her free hand to Danny. He hesitated for a second, then he took it. His palm was hot when he wrapped it around Emily´s and almost hid it whole in his fist.  
Donnie and Jordan walked behind those three like the defeated ones.  
They talked and laughed all the way home. Donnie knew many funny stories and others were filling the gaps in them, making fun and picking on each other. Joey was the group claun and he had the best voice to tell jokes. Emily held onto Danny´s hand firmly, sometimes she looked at him if he was having fun too. All the time, she noticed him looking at her. She always smiled and tucked on his hand to let him know even tho Joey and Donnie did not shut up for a second, she still gives some attention to him too.

When they finally got to the hotel, Emily had sore throat from all the laughing and her abdomen hurt.  
They went right to the rooms. She let go of Joey, who was eager to get something on, that was not wet and crusty from all the salt. Now she was left with Danny. Jordan retreated to his room and Donnie acted like he is not there with them. He started to study some bulletin on the wall like it was the most interesting thing he ever saw.

“That was fun,” started Danny, not knowing what else to say.

“Yup,” Emily answered. She noticed she was still holding his hand, but she did not want to let go.  
She even pulled a little and Danny turned to her: “Nice dress,” he said after a few seconds of a quiet admiring. He was smirking and his hazelnut eyes wandered all around her blushed face.

She was staring into those dark eyes like under a spell. “Thanks, Jon picked it,” she answered and too late realized the mistake.

Danny stepped back. “Well he has a really good taste in fashion,” he let go of her hand and left her standing there like frozen, while he got back to his room.

“If I can give any advice…” started Donnie, who was secretly listening to everything, but Emily stopped him with an open palm and disappeared behind her room door.


	6. Changes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Intelligence is the ability to adapt to change."  
> Stephen Hawking

The week passed through fast. Lucy trained Emily in everything she needed to know for the tour, to help her maintain all the necessities for everything to go smoothly. She gave her even few tips on how to get rid of adult or teenage fans, who are just too clingy and how to behave on signing events.

The only thing Emily did not know was the argue Hugo had with Lucy and all the Kids yesterday. Lucy sent her to buy some stuff and they had a meeting without her.

“Guys,” started Hugo and everyone was already annoyed by his voice, “I am really glad you all got a new helper here, but I´ve been thinking, and I am pretty sure, we can´t hold this young lady here with us. I am very sorry, but she has to go.”

All Kids and Lucy stood there in shock, then they started to shout one over another. Hugo calmed them down and tried to explain.  
“Look guys, she is too much of a distraction for you. Do not take me wrong, but you all flaunt around her and you do not focus on the important stuff, like the upcoming tour. Your friends will be here any day and, as I heard, you did not do that good on the singing training or even at the dancing rehearsals. This cannot continue. Lucy is more than capable of maintaining one more tour before I get you a new helper.”

“SHE IS NOT DISTRACTING US!” screamed Joey.

“No, sure she is not, Joe,” said Hugo with sarcasm, “you are holding her here just because Danny has a crush on her!” he pointed at the said member.  
Danny made a step closer to Hugo with his fists raised, but Donnie held him back. But he did not manage to hold up Joey too. Benjamin sprung off his chair and stood nose to nose with Hugo.

“She stays, or I go,” he growled.

“Joey,” said Jordan gently and pulled the youngest member from their manager. Hugo just stood there, visibly pleased he made him mad. “It is not worth it,” whispered Jordan calmly to Joey. Even Jon, standing silently behind them, clenched his fists and his jaw stiffened.

“So you all wish for her to stay?” he looked at everyone. They all nodded. “Fine then, she can stay,” Hugo smiled but it was not a nice smile.

***********

“Dismissed?!” yelped Emily.

“Yup,” said Lucy sadly.

“He can't do that! You are a valuable member of this family. He can't just dismiss you without any reason!!!” Emily started pacing back and forth in the room, palms on her face.

“You will do great, darling,” tried Lucy to calm her, “I will stay one more week here, that was the last wish Hugo had to fulfill. I will teach you everything I can. I know you are a quick learner and look how well you adapted! It is only a short time and you have every single Kid listening to you like you wrapped them around your pinkie! This job is not only about hard working but also about having some fun too. Trust me when I say, you will rock this tour and any tours after this.” Lucy winked at her.

Emily ran to the old lady and hugged her firmly. She was like a best friend, mother and grandma in one for her.  
Lucy rocked with her left and right, trying to soothe her young friend.

“I don't want you to go,” mumbled Emily, holding her tears.

“Darling, I am not going to the grave yet. I am too young for that!” she laughed. “I will finally have some time for my family. My husband is long gone, but my kids miss me and my grandkids want to see their nana more often. You can all visit me when you get back home.”

“We'll do,” promised Emily and hugged her tightly.

**********

After this, no Kid wanted to have anything to do with Hugo. They could not dismiss him as easily as he could Lucy, but they were grumpy anytime he showed up. They even made a few pranks on him. Especially Donnie was a master in it and others were gladly helping him.

Emily got most of the work after Lucy, who was her shadow for the last week. Together, they got the tour bus ready, managed to get everything in order with supplies, clothes for different shows and talked with tons of people from the crew to make sure they are ready and know Emily is the new production lady.

Lucy left her hotel room early in the morning. She thought she could vanish quickly and unnoticed, but she met the farewell group waiting for her by the door to the parking lot.  
Joey was crying big sad tears. Emily was trying her best not to cry too. She knew them all just a few days but she grew so much to each and every one, except Hugo, she felt like she was losing a family member. Others were just standing there in silence.  
Donnie was holding a basket with stuff they all bought and knew Lucy liked. Danny had an enormous puget of red roses.

Lucy tried to be strong, but when she saw all of them, she could not hold back tears. “We will see each other soon, do not worry, after you get back from tour, I am expecting you all by my door! No excuses!” she laughed as she hugged everyone separately and got all the gifts.

“Be good and nice to Emily or she will call me and I will go to wherever you will be and kick all of your asses!” she threatened playfully and left the hotel to get to the taxi.

She left Jacqueline, the old transformed minibus, to Emily. She had to use it to ride from one arena to another, if they will be in a riding proximity. Lucy told her everything about the bus, what she could find there and what to do in situations like ripped trousers, stains and minor injuries.

“I will miss her,” sniveled Joey, holding Jordan around the neck and crying silently into his shoulder. He was really emotional and such tragedy broke this poor baby down. They all went to the bar to drink up the sorrow.

“Do not forget about tomorrow!” called Hugo behind them, but nobody answered, they just showed him their backs.

“What is happening tomorrow?” asked Emily, holding Jon around waist. He was a strong guy but he too was overwhelmed with emotions and his dark green eyes were full of tears he tried so much to hold back.

“Our companions will arrive,” answered Donnie.

“Who?” Emily was confused. She thought she knew every member of the crew that was going with them on the tour.

“Oh nobody, just some Backstreet Boys,” waved his hand Donnie with feigned lack of interest in the topic.

Emily halted: “You kidding me, right?”

“Why should I?” Donnie´s wide smile showed he was not joking at all, just making fun of her. “You know those guys by any chance?” he giggled.

Emily was only capable of humming for the rest of the day.

**********

The next day was all free from any work. Emily put on her nicest summer dress Jon picked for her and went to welcome the new singers and dancers for the group. She had no idea BsB, her second favourite group of teenage years, was cooperating with Kids on this tour.

When she got down to the lobby, she saw a bit of a hustle by the entrance.

“Are we there yet?”

“Nah, we are still in the bus, silly, of course we are here!”

“I need to pee like right now!”

“Hold it up, shall you?!”

“Are we even in the right hotel?”

“Hello?” said Emily, when she slowly creeped closer to the fortress of bags, backpacks and traveling suitcases.

Blonde guy with nice sharply pointed face and friendly blue eyes stuck his head out off the pile. “Oh hello!” he said and gave her his nicest smile. “Receptionist?” he asked.

Emily giggled, “No, I am here with New Kids, are others with you?” she asked. She was so trying not to freak out, when Brian smiled at her and she so much held her fangirling on the leash. She was now the main production lady so she had to have some style.

“Sure they are. Guys!” he yelled over his shoulder and the fort of the bags fell apart into four small towers with four guys standing next to them.

“Brian, nice to meet you,” the smaller smiling guy with eyes like starlight shook with her hand. Emily sighed. This was really a dream come true. “E...mily,” she squeezed out of her lungs.

“This hotel has really nice employees, that's for sure,” Nick, who came second to introduce himself, shook her hand.  
Brian slapped himself on the forehead, “Production lady, not receptionist, you dumb.”  
“Even better.” said Nick with lust in his voice and kissed her hand.

“This is the best welcoming we could ever hope for!” a raspy voice shocked Emily. It belonged to A.J., who came to introduce himself. He took off his sunglasses to show her his nice chocolate eyes with mischievous spark in them. He kinda resembled of Donnie.

“And I am always left to be the last, guys,” mumbled Howie. He was even smaller than Emily thought he was. She was the same height as him, so she had undisturbed view into his big round puppy eyes. Emily sighed, she always had a soft spot for Howie.

“BOOOOOOOOOOOYS!” screamed a high pitched voice from the hallway belonging to Joey.

“KIIIIIIIIIIIIIDS!” yelled Nick in answer.

Joey and Nick ran to each other like a long lost lovers, hugged and then started fighting lightly.

“Here we go again,“ Howie sighed and with Brian they went back to their suitcases to get them in their rooms.

Kids welcomed the Boys with sincere joy and love.  
“We noticed you grew up one member up when we were gone,” said Nick, eyeing Emily standing next to Joey, who was jumping up and down in excitement.

“She is a big help to us,” answered Danny, watching his friend cautiously.

“She will be to us as well I hope,” Nick smiled as Emily looked their way.

**********

Boys were quickly shown to their rooms, because it was already time for breakfast and according to A.J.´s rumbling stomach they did not eat too much during the flight here.

Emily was way ahead of everyone and asked the hotel management to prepare one long table for all of them to fit around.  
They all found their seat next to someone they wanted to talk to, so basically they all sat as: Kid, Boy, Kid, Boy. Emily was safely seated with her back to the wall between Danny and Jordan in the middle of the long table. She could comfortably look both ways and talk to each member without problems, but she just sat there, ate her breakfast and listened with awe.  
They were mostly talking over each other, but she was picking parts of the stories and casual talks.  
Even Jon relaxed, while in a deep conversation with Brian. Nick, seated in front of her between Jon and Donnie, was looking at her all the time. Everytime Emily looked up from her plate to see what is the topic, she noticed two seductive light blue eyes focused on her.

For the first few minutes it flattered her, she did her best to look beautiful today anyway, but the long staring of his slowly became uncomfortable. She did not even lift her sight from the plate to look around.  
Danny next to her shifted closer: “Anything bothering you?” he whispered.

“I am fine, I just need to use the bathroom. Excuse me for a moment,” perhaps a cold water will cool her anxiety down. She stood up.

Nick stood up as well and so quickly, he almost knocked over his chair. It was an act of chilvarility to stand up when the lady was leaving the table and Emily gave him a tiny smile to let Nick know she noticed. Danny straightened on his chair, but her hand on his shoulder pushed him back down. She walked around the table and disappeared in the ladies bathroom.

Jordan leaned closer to Danny over Emily´s empty seat. “Calm down, bodyguard, there is nothing to worry about,” he whispered.

Danny only growled and focused on his breakfast. Nick sat down, when Emily left and his eyes met with Danny’s for a split second. Either was the Boy´s benjamin blind, or he did not notice the storm Dan was sending his way.

**********

The whole day was spent in the cool walls of the hotel. Emily was with Hugo most of the time. Kids did not like that, because all they saw was Hugo schooling Emily and their beloved friend looking sad and confused. They had no idea what they were discussing.

Emily was walking like a ghost for the rest of the day and she went to bed early in the evening. Kids were worried about her, Joey hugged her when she was on her way to her room. She smiled sadly, hugged him back and left.

“I do not like this, guys,” mumbled Donnie.

“She just has a lot of work on her shoulders,” answered Jordan.

“Let's not make it more than it is needed,” Danny murmur.

“I agree. We have a lot of work tomorrow, everybody to beds,” for the first time, Joey was the mature one and send everyone with good nights to their rooms.


	7. Better burn down

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "The brighter the fire is, the quicker it extinguishes."  
> -Seneca

Next week, and the last one before the big tour, was filled with dancing, singing and even more dancing. The Kids had to adjust to Boys even tho they trained together all last month, but Boys had some other work to do so Kids had to train the whole next month alone. Now they had to put both of their dancing lessons together.

Emily was with them all the time. She was sitting by the wall in the dancing studio with tons of papers on her lap and phone constantly by her ear.  
“Looks like Hugo left all of his work on her.” said Jon when they had a break. Everyone, even Boys, turned to the girl in the corner. She had forgot about her nice dresses and wore sweatpants, sneakers and comfy shirts all the time. Her hair was clasped in a small bun to stop it from falling into her eyes.

She was not talking to them as much as before, most of her time was taken by work around the upcoming tour and the closer the first show was, the more stressed Emily looked.

The day before the first show, everyone packed their things and went into their busses. Backstreet Boys had their own bus their manager prepared for them, before he left them in Emily´s and Hugo´s hands.  
Talking about Hugo, he did not show for a few days. He appeared before leaving. He had his own bunk bed in the tour bus next to Kids. Emily had to travel with minibus.

Joey and Jordan helped her with her bags in the minibus.

“Will you be ok?” asked Joey. He clearly saw her red eyes.

She tried her best to smile to comfort him. “I will wait for you all in the arena. You will get there just a few hours after me,” she patted him on the shoulder and entered the minibus.

Danny, Donnie and Jon were packing their bags into the big tour bus when she drove around, waving at them.

Thankfully, Lucy had navigation installed in Jacquelina so Emily did not get lost. The first show was in a nearby city, so she could take minibus with her. Then three more were nearby, the next five ones were quite far away, but still in the driving proximity. Hugo planned this tour kinda well.

Emily got to her destination early in the afternoon, way before Kids and Boys. They and their busses would come in the evening. The show was tomorrow, so she had time to relax and prepare for her first big test.

**********  
First who came, were The Backstreet Boys. The stage was almost ready for their dancing and sound tests. Emily seated herself in one chair near the main stage, leg over leg and hidden in her leather jacket, trying to catch some sleep before work.

The sounds and voices of Boys did not woke her up at all, they soothed her even more. Then she heard that Kids arrived. She was listening with eyes closed to the shenanigans they did on the stage.

“Em?” someone asked.

She opened her eyes and looked up. Donnie was squatting near her and reaching his hand to her. “Best way to wake up is to move. Come up!”

“I can´t, the stage is all yours. You are the stars here,” she smiled sleepily.

“Oh c´mon! You are part of the stars!” he tried to convince her and wiggled his fingers on the outstretched hand.

Emily hesitated for a minute. Then she said to herself it couldn't hurt, and grasped Donnie´s hand. He pulled her up like she was nothing.

It was weird to stand on the stage. Yes, all the thousands of seats were empty now, only Nick, Jordan, Joey and A.J. were sitting there, chatting. Emily was on the stage alone with Donnie and a few members of the crew who were plugging in some sound devices.

“Wanna dance?” Donnie´s smile widened.

“What you want to dance?”

“Anything you know.”

“I know every dance you can pull out. Try me,” she was ready to fight. Her adrenaline started pumping in the veins. She had no fun with Kids for a few days and she was so missing it.

“Confident, are we? Suit yourself,” Donnie signalled the sound mixing guy in the booth on the other side of the arena. “Gustav, can you put on the track 5. please?” he said to his microphone he was holding. His voice was heard through the whole empty room.

Emily waited anxiously, but the song was the easiest she could imagine - Step by Step. She watched Kids dance this for so many times in the videos and even on the rehearsals, she remembered every single move. 

“Show me what you got.” Donnie waited for the refrain and pulled out his best moves he learned in the dance studio. To his surprise, Emily did absolutely the same moves he did. She was singing to herself with the track too. In mind she was thanking the devotion Andy put into her own personal training when they had some time alone. She also thanked her undying patience, because Emily was a horrible learner.

Donnie waved at Gustav in the booth and showed 4 on his fingers.”Impressive. How about this?” the song “You got this” started playing.

“You are underestimating my powers.” grinned Emily.

To her surprise, Donnie pushed second microphone into her hand. With this, Emily get the post of Jordan in this song. She never had any singing training, but she did her best. She had no bad voice for singing, but there were many high pitches she could not sing, so she just held onto her lower voice, thinking how the hell was Jordan able not to destroy his own vocal cords on this.

The four, sitting in the auditorium, watched in awe as Emily pulled out every single move perfectly as if she was practicing with them all the time.

Donnie felt ashamed and when Emily was not watching, he showed number 8 on his fingers.

Emily halted, when the music changed rapidly from the lovable romance into “Dirty dancing”. This meant war.  
She took off her leather jacket to show a light brown tank top. The small audience woo-ed and someone whistled joyfully. Donnie grinned.

“Get Danny, pronto.” said Jordan to Joey and the youngest member disappeared in a flash.

Emily and Donnie pulled the sexiest way of Dirty dancing, the stage could ever see. She had flawless leg moves and her singing was not that bad even tho she was not used to that echo, due to her lack of earphones. She playfully danced around Donnie and wiggled her butt at him and he was more than happy to join her.

She also forgot that her tank top showed more than she wanted and the bending forward for the Dirty dancing gave everyone a pleasant view on everything she had to offer up there. She noticed too late at the time every Kid and Boy was pressed on the edge of the stage, except Donnie on it with her. She noticed the line of where they were staring, quickly straighten up and covered her cleavage with an open palm and fake horrified face, that quickly turned into laughing.

“Fuck our show, this beats us a million times over,” said A.J. He was standing there with both of his elbows on the stage and his cheeks pressed onto his fists, looking like a schoolgirl in love. He even lifted one of his feet up in the air and sighed.

“I envy your production,” said Brian, blushed from head to toes.

“Our production sits in the backstage and their name is Phil,” mumbled Nick.

Jordan's hand outstretched and gently closed Joey´s mouth, that was hanging open the whole time.

Howie, standing next to Danny looked at him and then poked him in the shoulder. Danny woke up like from a dream, blinked a few times, shook his head and turned away from the stage.

“You ok?” asked Howie.

“Never been better,” he smirked.

Emily turned red and quickly retrieved her jacket “Animals,” she giggled when she was zipping the jacket up and heard the disappointed sigh of nine guys. “No more today!” she called and headed to the stairs down. Donnie rushed to help her, holding her hand courteously. Jordan was waiting downstairs to take her hand when Donnie could not reach further, and helped her down.

“Such a gentlemen suddenly,” Emily smiled at the guys, standing there in awe. Then she left to the backstage to do some serious work. She felt her cheeks turning red and she did not want them to see her all flustered. She noted to herself that if she will be dancing anytime soon, to get a firm bra and turtleneck at least.

**********

Emily had so much work and almost no time for resting for the remaining evening. Thankfully the whole show ended up nicely, except Joey ruining his trousers, but a quick needle and thread fixed that in no time. When the Kids and Boys went to their busses, she came with them to retrieve Jacqueline.

“This was one hell of a blast!” Donnie, Joey and Nick were so hyped, they were jumping around like excited labradors for the whole way down to the parking lot.  
Others had enough for one night and even tho they were all smiling and happy, they were also tired as all hell.

“I am glad you all enjoyed the show,” said Emily.

“And thanks to you nothing went wrong,” said Jordan, held her around shoulders and gently shook her. Emily gave him a tired smile.

“Come with us to the bus, we celebrate the start of this amazing tour,” offer A.J.

“No way!” said Joey and stopped jumping around, “she is OUR lady, she will go to OUR bus to celebrate!”

“She must be more than tired of all of your shenanigans!” answered Nick and they both started frowning at each other.  
Nick was way taller than Joey so Jo had to stand on his tiptoes, but he frowned even more.

“C´mon guys, no fights,” said Emily “You are all tired, let´s rest. I have to travel to the second city. I will wait for your busses by tomorrow afternoon. Good night,” she gently shook Jordan's hand from her shoulders, waved and left.

“Hugo is a bitch,” mumbled Donnie, when he watched her leaving.

“Who is Hugo?” asked Howie.

“Be thankful you have no idea,” answered Danny.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Who else starts to hate Hugo as much as me? I created that person from nothing and I hate him with all my life :D


	8. The Fabulous five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "You don't need what you forget."
> 
> -John Lennon

Emily spent the night in the minibus getting to the next destination. The roads were narrow and mostly empty during the whole night but that all just made her more dizzy and she was lucky she did not hit anything. She had to stop for a minute to turn on some music on her mobile phone and she spent the rest of the ride singing loudly to stay awake.  
Finally, as she parked by the arena at three in the morning, she crawled back in the minibus to catch some sleep. She had only five or less hours of sleep before the arena opens and she would be able to check everything and oversee the building of the podium. The crew would come at 9AM and busses with singers at 3PM, because it had to stop to get gas and supplies and it also rode slow.

Hugo was late, as always. Yesterday he showed only for like half an hour just before the show, gave Emily some work to do and then left who knows where. Of course, when Emily entered the hall, there was only her and few members of the morning shift.

She managed to fix a few problems with misplaced cables and lost stuff that was obviously lying somewhere visible, but the crew guys just did not notice it until she came and pointed it to them.

Busses came on time and she went to greet them. While Boys were sleepily exiting the bus and blinking in the sudden bright light, Kids were eager to meet their lady.  
Emily waved at Danny when she saw him in the window and he ran to the door to meet her, but Joey had the same idea, thinking maybe she was waving at him, and they both got stuck in the door. 

“Oh, not again,” giggled Emily.

Joey tried to climb over Danny, his long white hands and legs dangling around him, but Dan smashed him with shoulder against the wall on the stairs and exited freely. Joey stopped there, squished on the wall as some kind of an insect hit by a flapper.

Emily looked so tired and stressed and she felt that way too. But all that did not matter if she could get some hugs. Danny ran to her and she was so scared of the crash, she ducked, but Danny just picked her up and squeezed her in a bear hug. Her feet were dangling above the ground like she weighted nothing to him. She even lifted one of her feet up like a carried princess.  
“So glad to see ya again!” he mumbled into her neck “I...We were all worried about you traveling tired at night!”

Emily got goosebumps when she heard that rumbling voice resonating around her ear, but all she did was hug him around his shoulders, “I travel safely. Next time, I will text you when I get to the stop, ok?”  
He only murmured in answer.

Joey peeled himself off the wall, jumped out of the bus and ran to greet her too. Donnie was just behind him, speeding up with all his might to get to Emily before him, no matter what.

Danny set Emily down on her own feet that were suddenly so weak they almost broke under her. She had to hold onto him to keep her balance.

“You look great today!” Danny said although she was wearing her cozy black sweatpants and a long comfy sweatshirt. Her hair could use some care too and she had not much time to do her makeup this morning. Yet, when she heard that praise, she turned red as a beet.

In that flash, Joey and Donnie got to their destination. Joey, always the unpredictable one, jumped on the couple and knocked Emily down on her butt. Donnie followed his example and too jumped on the pile. Emily huffed as two grown up men ended up on her. Joey was covering her right cheek with tiny kisses, Donnie gave her a hug that almost squeezed all air from her lungs. Danny was much more gentle with the hugging before.

Jordan and Jon walked slowly to them. Danny raised a hand to stop Jordan, when he was just about to faceplant into the men mountain above Emily, and then he pulled both of his lying friends on their legs.

Emily half sat, half lyed there all flustered and glad of that lovable greeting, “I know I am irresistible, but I am also indispensable, so do not break me yet,” she laughed as she held onto Danny´s hand and he pulled her back up on her legs. He even dusted off her side and back.

Jordan, stopped from joining the greeting pile, at least hugged Emily. Jon did the same and his hug was so sincere and strong, “I missed you,” he whispered. She gave him her best of hugs.

“So much love,” smiled Brian who looked from their bus and his face was lit up like a kid in a candy store.

Jon let Emily go quickly and retrieved back behind his brother, his cheeks flushed red. He obviously did not meant his hug to look like that.

“We are one big family,” giggled Emily.

Nick was so ready to hug her too. But just as he lifted his hands, Emily´s phone rang. She put a finger up, to stop him from coming closer, and picked her phone.

“Emily. Hello. Yes. No way. Really?! How?” she started and without looking anywhere around, she walked through Kids and then rushed, with her phone on the ear, up to the stage.

Nick just stood there awkwardly with his hands half raised, ready for hug. A.J. did not want to leave him hanging so he hugged him. Nick tried to fight to get away, but A.J. held him firmly until Nick got pretty annoyed. Even Brian joined the hug. Howie was just standing there, watching his silly friends.

**********

Emily got the worst news: one of the boxes with Kids show clothes was left in the last city!  
Without that box, Kids would not be able to quick-change, while Boys would be on the stage and there was almost every single pack of clothes in it!

Everything was lost. The box would get to them in the evening, but still too late for the show anyway. She walked around the room in the backstage, holding her forehead and thinking. This was the worst thing! The show starts at 8 PM, box would be here at 9:30 and it was already 15:30! There was no time for the box to came on time.

She walked some more in circles. Then she decided. She made a quick call with Hugo to tell him what happened, half expecting he would blame everything on her, which he did, but he gave her access to the full credit card. She had one with limited cash, since she had to buy some necessities like snacks or other groceries for Kids and Boys when it was needed, but this time she had the unlimited card to serve her needs.

Kids were pretty surprised when she ran to their lounge and commanded everyone to stand up. They did as she asked, and to their surprise she checked everyone´s shirt and trousers tags and asked for shoe sizes. They gave her all the numbers, she wrote them down and stormed out again.

“What was that all about?” asked Donnie as he was sitting back down.

“I have no idea,” Jordan was jumping a little, “but we have to tell her not to tuck on the trousers anymore, everything I hold dear was squished,” he tried to loosen his trousers Emily pulled too high for his liking while checking the tag on the back of it. He walked to his traveling vanity bag and halted. “Hey! And who's been using my hair gel again?!” he picked almost empty can of strong cooling hair gel from his bag.  
The silence fell on the room, even some crew and bodyguards who were with them in the room shut up and looked around, confused. Everybody was trying not to look at Jordan, who was getting furious.  
“Well,” said Jordan with suspiciously calm voice, “that particular gel was pretty strong with menthol and I hope that anyone who used it gets at least itchy!” he smashed the can at the table and turned to his bag to find something else. “I swear, nobody here has any dignity about personal stuff anymore!” he was mumbling.  
Danny, who was furiously scratching the back of his head at that time, halted, widened his eyes at other Kids and quickly put his hand down.

**********

Emily borrowed a car from one of their crew members to get to the city quicker. Thankfully, the city mall was not that far away. She ran there with a paper of numbers and names on it, ready to shop. She never liked shopping that much, but for Kids it was something else.  
She had to get four different types of clothes styles for five differently build guys without any trying on. If she gots something randomly, she had to be sure it would fit the right member.

Thankfully, her remembering of the proportions of every guy were more than right. She touched, hugged and even secretly admired them for many hours.  
Yesterday she even walked in the dressing room by mistake, finding Jordan, Danny and Donnie in their underwear, currently in a towel fight. It seemed like Donnie was winning. When they saw her, they quickly stopped. Jordan even pulled his towel over his chest like she could see something inappropriate on him, and made a little O with his mouth. Danny looked over to her and his eyes widened.  
Emily just stood there, frozen.  
“You like what you see?” said Donnie lustfully and jokingly. He even flexed his arms for her.  
She made an “eeeeeehm” sound and quickly left with her eyes focused on the ground.

Present Emily laughed for herself on reacting in such a way. She still felt her ears getting red when she remembered the situation.

She was running from shop to shop and the boxes and bags in her arms were piling up. Thankfully, the mall had one handsome and helpful guard, who just had no work to do at the moment and Emily´s struggle with bags and her nice desperate smile convinced him to help her. Through her apologies and assuring she could do it herself, he picked most of the bags and walked behind her all the time, as she was picking more and more stuff.

She did her best not to forget anything.  
She also remembered that Joey said he had no nice boxers to wear. Since she had no idea what size he wore, she just picked the most accurate ones, hoping that if it did not fit him, someone would wear it anyway and if not, she would take them as a cozy wearings for a home time.  
Then, in the men underwear section, she noticed something awesome - superhero boxers!  
Emily walked to the table with the special underwear, her faithful carrier behind her back. They were also in grown up men sizes too. It was a wild idea, but she loved it.  
She was deciding a long time about the types of superheroes and the sizes. Of course, she had a quite good measurement with all five butts, but sizes of the fronts and hips were still a mystery for her. She sighed and guessed the sizes, hoping she will not hurt anyone's needed parts or ego.

**********

It was 19:25, almost time for the showdown, when Emily returned. The guard helped her put all bags in the car, asked for her phone number and left happily with a small paper in his chest pocket.

Fans were already piling up in front of the arena when she pulled the car in the parking lot. She called two arena guys who were having their cigarette time there, packed them up with stuff and sent them to the Kids dressing room.

**********

“Where is my jacket?!” Joey was already looking for his stuff for the first coming up. Jon and Jordan were by the makeup table, making their cheeks flawlessly smooth. Danny was over by the sofa, spiking his short hair up. Only Donnie was sitting down, leg over leg and calmly reading news on his phone.

“I need my fecking jacket!” yelled Joey. Suddenly, a wished jacket actually landed on his head. It still had a size tag on it.

Emily was standing in the doorway with two piles of bags and boxes. “I am sorry for the late coming, but there was a huge problem with your clothes box. It will not came here before the show starts so… well… I got you some new stuff, if you’d like to see it.” she pointed at all the things around her.

Joey´s face lit up as it was an early christmas. He forgot about the jacket and ran to her to pick up his portion. Emily found everything that was meant to be for Joey, stuffed it into a few bags and gave it to him for inspection. He ran to the corner of the room to check it and to be sure nobody would steal anything from him.

Then others came to her to get their share, and retrieved into different places of the room to dig through their new stuff.

“NO WAY!” screamed Donnie as he picked up half torn light blue jeans, white t-shirt and a motorbike jacket in his size that were packed in one bag.

“Hey, that looks familiar,” said Danny, focusing on the clothes, trying to remember.

“Hell it looks familiar! It's almost the same I wore when I was, like, twenty! This is the stuff I wore in “Cover girl” video! You know, that Columbia live we had years back!”

“I have something, too!” yelped Joey and picked up shirt with a big smiley face on it and looked at it in awe. There was also a pair of blue jeans and a black hat for it.  
Jon was petrified about what he would get in his “late 90's” bag.

“Where did you get all that?!” asked Jordan as he too found the proper type of clothes.

Emily turned red, half ashamed, half happy. “I thought it would suit you as a kinda recession to your old videos. It was hard to find similar stuff, but I hope I did it.”

Joey stood up, got to Emily and gave her the biggest and wettest smooch on the cheek he could do. “It's great!”

The door to the dressing room opened up and sound crew looked in “Guys, twenty minutes.” he pointed to his watch and left.

“Well, good luck with it, guys,” she waved at them and left the room. She heard a few surprised yelps and laughs while she was walking down the hallway.  
She was so tired. All the stressing and running drained her energy to the minimum. But there was still show to attend to and be ready at.

She found her place on the right side of the podium, behind the barriers parting her and the screaming fangirls. There she had a bar stool ready and some water and protein bars if any Kid or Boy needed help. There were paramedics sitting in the shadow behind her just to be ready for anything.

The show started. First few songs were together Kids and Boys. Thankfully all Boys had their stuff ready, thanks to their not-forgetful production, so she had no work searching for clothes for four more guys she knew almost nothing about.

**********

It was time for Kids to show their first outfit for Dirty dancing and for some shenanigans after it. Emily was so nervous to see them.  
Donnie was first who emerged from the artificial mist followed by others. They all had similar grey trousers and white and silver sneakers. The difference was in the tops and accessories. Donnie had half open black shirt with white and silver fedora on his head.  
Jordan's black shirt was open, showing white undershirt and he tuned up the style with new long silver chainlet.  
Joey had silver vest over his black shirt. He just loved vests and Emily remembered that.  
Danny had the short sleeve type of black shirt showing his forearms - he even rolled them up more - and a tight silver tie.  
Jon get satisfied with all buttoned up shirt and a silver belt on his trousers.

Emily was proud of herself. Although she could pick even bigger shirt sizes for Danny and Donnie since their shoulders were broader than she thought, they all looked great in their new clothes.  
And finally, Danny had no problems with rolling up his trousers. It was hard for him to get trousers in the right hip size and length at the same time. Most of the time he had to roll up the legs of the trousers if he did not want to trip over them and he kinda looked like a kid in his father's clothes.  
Emily picked her stuff pretty thoughtfully.

“Ladiiiiieees!” called Donnie seductively, making the crowd go wild. Emily almost lost her hearing.

“We have a surprise for you, but you will have to help my friends to show you,” he pointed at the four blushed guys behind him. Girls screamed as if their life depended on it. Emily started to realise what was probably going to happen and she turned red.

“Dear ladies, you never found out our secret identities and now, here, we will show you!” Donnie started to take off his black belt and unzipping his pants. Joey on the side of the stage started doing the same. Jon was so flustered he hid in the shadows between speakers.  
Jordan and Danny hesitated.

Donnie turned back to the fans and showed a part of his crimson underwear. A red and black logo of a easily-drawn Deadpool mask showed on his buttcheeck. He wiggled his bottom a bit, making the fans laugh and scream. Emily covered her eyes, but peaked a little through her fingers.

Joey was able to pull his trousers open to show a bright red boxers with yellow Flash logo on the side of his hip. Fangirls near him yelled their throats off.

“C´mon guys!” supported Donnie his three hesitating friends. 

Jordan joined the hype, stood between Danny and Donnie, unbuckled his belt and pulled the side of his trousers, showing bright blue underwear with yellow edge and red S. Some girls already screamed the name of this superhero.  
Emily obviously picked wrong sizes since “The Superman boxers” were meant to be on Jon. With this, Joey as Flash and Deadpool on Donnie, the remaining two were easy to guess.

Donnie put on his trousers and ran to Danny, who was just standing there, grinning nervously and shaking his head. Jordan followed and together they pulled on Dannys trousers, almost taking the boxers off too accidentally. Danny yelped, started laughing and held the bright yellow and black boxers on place. There was a Wolverine logo on his hip. Fangirls went nuts.  
When that was enough for him, Danny hushed others away to get Jon and zipped up his pants. Emily was red as a lobster, giggling to herself. So at least she did only one size mistake.

Jon was hard to get, but after a few seconds of convincing, holding him to prevent him from running away, they were able to pull his trousers so Batman logo was shown on his black and yellow boxers. Jon, all flustered and anxious, ran to the backstage to calm down. Emily got up to find him. She took a water and a chocolate bar for him too, he needed to cool a bit and quickly before they were going to start singing again.

Jon was sitting in the backstage, shaking and mumbling.

Emily sat beside him, gave him the water and chocolate and hugged him around shoulders. He immediately calmed down. “They should not do it. I knew what will happen and I did not want to participate in it, but they managed to persuade me.” he said shakily. The bottle in his hands was trembling.

“Just ate the chocolate.” she said silently and softly, patting him on the back.

Suddenly, Donnie ran to the backstage and braked before them. “Jon, we are sorry. It was just a joke. You do not need to sing anymore today, if you do not want to.”

But Jon stood up while finishing his bar. “I can do it. I am not as weak as you may think,” he took a sip of water and handed the bottle to Emily. Then he straightened his shoulders and left with Donnie back on the stage.  
Emily was so proud of him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long wait. Here is the continue and it will be here the whole soon :-)


	9. The poisoned apple

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Drug poison only distinguishes the amount administered."  
> \- Philippus A. T. Paracelsus, physician and alchemist

Rest of the concert was mostly calm. Emily was tired but happy that everything ended up well. She met with Boys and Kids by the parking lot.  
They all took showers in the arena backstage and they were even more fresh and bouncy than before the concert.

They were chatting, laughing and running around. Emily was just walking in between of the group, dragging one leg after another, her back bowed. Her hair was a huge mess, she needed a shower too, but there was no time for that. She has to continue to the next location. She will get some morning shower in the other arena they are heading into. If she finds some time to care of herself, of course.

Joey noticed that their friend lady looked horrible and he hugged her. He smelled of a fruity shampoo and a mint chewing gum. “Parched?” he asked, his pretty face worried.

Emily was able only to nod and smile softly. She raised one hand and run her fingers through Joey's wet hair. He purred.

“Jon was amazing today!” sounded from the other Kids. Donnie, Danny and Jordan were leading Jon to the bus, patting him on the shoulders for fighting with his anxiety. Jon was smiling, but Emily knew well it was just a fake smile. His eyes were full of fear and so much anxiety. He probably wanted to crawl in the furthest corner and die there, if he could.

“Your outfits were different than yesterday. Did something happened?” asked Brian who noticed the change.

“Ask our amazing production!” said Donnie with pride in his voice.

Joey answered instead of her, since he knew she was so tired even for talking, and reproduced the whole story.  
Boys made O´s with their mouths when they got to know about the lost clothes box and her spastic run to get them new stuff.

“That 90's clothes made our fans crazy!!” laughed Jordan.

“I never heard twenty thousand people laughing that much at once. And I was in the backstage by that time,” said A.J.

“Oh, c´mon, it was fun! I would not wear anything else from now on for our Cover girl performance!” Donnie was fighting for it and Danny nod.

“You are just the best!” Joey kissed Emily on the cheek, making her blush.

She soon excused herself and left for her minibus. She promised them to get some sleep, but honestly, there was no time to sleep. The next show is in two days, but she still has to get to the next arena, watch the work there and then maybe catch some hours of sleep. Also, she has to be sure all clothes and needed boxes and chests are in place.

Boys and Kids bid her a good night and went to their buses to spend the night there.

**********

Jon was so anxious, he could not sleep. He was rolling in his bunk bed unable to find a comfortable position. The sounds of screaming fangirls, lights and the dense air made him dizzy. His eyes watered and everything became hazy. His breath shortened. He could not breathe. He felt itchy.

He woke up from a horrible dream, panting and clenching his pillow. He felt cold sweat trails on his back and forehead..

“Ya alright, buddy?” Danny´s head appeared upside down from above Jon´s bed.

Jordan, on the other side of the small aisle, pulled away his bed curtain to look what all the fuss is about. Joey, laying above him, was looking down at Jon with his tired but worried baby blue eyes. Donnie had bed next to Jordan and he was already sitting up, ready to run to his friend in need.

“I am fine, go back to sleep,” said Jon. His voice gave up on him. It faltered and he was out of breath. His heart was racing like a crazy.  
He sat up and pushed his feet on the ground. His fingers run through his bushy black hair. They were shaking profusely.

Jordan went pale when he saw his older brother like that, and kicked away his blanket to sit up as well.

Danny jumped down from his bed to Jon and sat beside him. He tried to hold him around shoulders, but Jon pulled away.

“Is it because of the thing we did to you at the podium?” asked Donnie, immediately regretting his stupid underwear event.

Jon shook his head and his breath skipped, when he tried to inhale. He was close to crying. Danny lifted hand and pat his friend softly on the shoulder.

“I am sorry if we upset you,” Joey climbed down from his bed and stood awkwardly in the corridor in his sleeping boxers and oversized shirt.

“We all are,” added Jordan, getting up from his bed as well. Donnie stood up too to join his friends. They all gathered around Jon´s bed and squated there.

Jordan put his hand on his brother's knee, “Is there anything we can do to calm you down?”

Jon was shaking, but the tremble was slowly calming down and he looked up. His green-grey eyes were full of fear tears: “I just can't sleep. I know I feel tired but I just can't fell asleep,” he said, every word from him was silent, “I just need some time out of bed to calm down,”

“We can watch some movie if you want to,” suggested Danny.

“I will be fine guys. You should get some sleep,” whispered Jon.

“Nonsense!” yelped Donnie, “it's movie night!”

Joey was like an excited dog: “I get the popcorn!” he run to the living room of the bus to fetch something. Jordan run with him.

Danny helped Jon to stand up and had to support him, when his shaky legs gave up under him, and wrapped him in his blankets like a burrito.

Donnie was already at the TV, picking up on netflix the series they would enjoy watching and mostly, what would Jon like and calm down while watching.

“We have no popcorn!” Joey run to the living room, absolutely horrified.

“Then get some outside! Chop chop!” Donnie hushed their benjamin away.

Joey run outside in his underwear, then he noticed when the cold weather hit him, run back, tossed on some trousers and shoes and get back out with Jordan by his tail who was going with him. Only to be sure Joey gets everything they need and he has money to buy it with.

Danny sat Jon on the comfortable sofa, brought him a blanket and wrapped Jon in a warm depressed burrito. “I will go out for a minute too. Be right back,” and with that, Danny left the bus too.

Jon was sitting there, wrapped in a blanket, so only his head and bare feet were showing. He was so glad he had such a good friends. They did nothing bad to him, he knew that, they were just having fun. He hated himself for reacting such way, but he could not stop it. He loved joking with them and he was always comfortable with other Kids, talking and laughing.  
Jon forget about his anxiety for the most of the time, but suddenly something like this happens and his fears runs back as a flood and drowns his calmed mind.

Jon adored his younger brother. Jordan was so confident and active. Anytime Jon felt the twinge of anxiety kicking while on the stage, he looked at him.  
Only the simple presence of his little bro by his side was enough for him most of the time. It was probably the acknowledge of having family around or the “older brother” protection feeling he felt inside, that overrun the anxiety.

“How about this?” Donnie´s voice cut off Jon´s thinking. His friend was pointing at the television, where he found the newest episodes of Grey's Anatomy.

“That would be fine,” said Jon and bury himself in the soft blanket and only the top of his head was showing.

Joey and Jordan get back soon, carrying five bags full of beer, lemonade, chips and more sweet stuff. Joey was holding two jumbo boxes of a fresh popcorn. One was salty, the other one caramel. According to the cinema add on the box, he probably run to a real cinema to retrieve actual movie popcorn for the evening.

They set everything down on the table and then, after everything was ready, they sat around Jon protectively and put the series on.  
Joey wanted to hug Jon all the time, but Donnie pushed him away. Instead of him, Donnie and Jordan sat by Jon on both sides and Joey got the place on the floor, leaning against the bottom of the sofa with his back.

“Sorry I am late,” Danny got to the bus. He was probably running, according to his short breath.

“It's still too early for your morning run, don't you think?” said Joey with sting in his voice. Their friend was having a hard time and Danny is who-knows-where.

Danny put a small bag on the table beside the other sweets and sat next to Joey. “Sorry, I did my best,” mumbled and shoved a handful of salted popcorn into his mouth.

The night was getting older as they watched fourth episode of Grey's anatomy. Joey fell asleep with his forehead leaning against Jordan´s leg, snoring lightly and drooling.

“How are you feeling?” asked Donnie.

“Better. Yet I will not get much sleep tonight anymore. But thanks for calming me down, guys,” said Jon and gave them a nice smile. Jordan hugged him around shoulders.

Danny reached for the bag he brought before. “Here, this will probably help ya to sleep,” he handed the bag to Jon.

He opened it only to find a few green coloured lollipops in it. “Lollies?” he asked, “that will hardly help me, but thanks anyway,” Jon´s sarcasm was slowly getting back, the sign of him feeling way better.  
He put one lollipop in his mouth. It had weird sweet and sour taste and it stung his tongue but he ate it anyway, it was a gift and he did not wanted to seem disrespectful.

Joey woke up at the sound of a rustling paper bag, “What is that?” he asked hungrily, eyeing the bag Danny was holding.

“Nothing for ya finicky tongue,” said Danny and hid the bag behind his back.

That fed Joeys interest, he noticed Jon happily sucking on a lollipop. He crawled on all four to Danny like a begging dog “just one?” he asked.

Danny looked up at his three friends for help.

“Give him one or he would not stop begging for the rest of the night and he would probably steal one when you are not looking, anyway,” said Donnie.

“It can probably calm him down, which will be a nice change,” added Jordan.

Jon said nothing, he was just happily chewing his lolly.

“Ok, fine,” Danny picked up a small lollipop and gave it to Joey. He snatched it and quickly put it in his mouth so no one will take it from him. “EEEEEW,” he said “it tastes gross,” he murmured, but sucked on the lollipop anyway, a treat is a treat.

“What's in it by the way?” asked Jordan, suddenly worried about his brother´s health, since he was eating something that was probably shady.

Danny smiled widely to let Jordan know that he probably knows already.

“Oh you did not,” said Jordan. Danny´s smile widened even more. “It can hurt him!”

“Naaah, it can´t,” added Donnie, who knew perfectly well from what the lollipops are made of.

“If you think so,” mumbled Jordan, but his eyes did not left his older brother, who was watching the film and eating that weird candy.

 

After the fourth episode ended, Jon yawned. “I want to sleep,” he announced.

Others helped him to get to bed, worried that the drugs in the lolly can have weird side effects, but Jon buried himself in the blankets and fell asleep.

“It visibly helped,” said Jordan, watching his bro snoring softly right after he touched the pillow.

“Yeah it helped!” added Danny while climbing up to his own bed.

“He will be a new man in the morning, trust me,” added Donnie and pulled his blanket over his head.

They left Joey in the living room. He was not sleepy and still munching on the lolly. Danny took the rest of the candy with him, not risking Joey eating it all.

**********

Jon had weird and hazy dreams. They were not anxiety dreams, just plane weird, like looking through the kaleidoscope while drunk. He tossed and turned, mumbling different stuff.

He woke up with a sore throat and dizzy. His heart was pounding so hard he was afraid it could stop at any moment. This was not anxiety, he never felt this way. His arms and legs were heavy and his face felt numb.  
He quickly rolled off the bed on the floor and got up. Other boys were still asleep, it was early in the morning. The soft yellow sun was already peeking into the bus through the front window. He felt like moving through a syrup, that heavy were his limbs.  
Jon stumbled through the bus and down the stairs. He needed some fresh air. It was probably a heart attack from all the stress he had yesterday.  
When he opened the door outside, a cold breeze hit his hot face, making him stagger. He could not hold up anymore, his eyes saw nothing but black dots.  
He tried to hold onto the stair rail, but he missed and face planted on the floor, three steps above the ground. He heard a loud crunching noise. Then everything went dark.

**********

Emily was so tired she said to herself that she needs at least two hours of sleep before driving. She put on an alarm and went to Jacqueline´s bed at night. Somehow, she was able to sleep over the alarm and woke up in a bright day.

“Oh sh..,” she run from the bed, put on some clothes and got out of the minibus. She looked around. Both busses were still on the spot. She noticed a person laying in the middle of the corridor between them. They had shorts and a black shirt on.

She slowly got closer to that person, thinking it might be an imposter or a homeless, but then she realised it was Jon.

“Ohmygash!” she run to him, kneeled and turned him over. His face was full of bruises, his nose broken and covered in clogged blood.  
“DANNY DONNIE JOEY JORDAN!” she yelled. She had no phone with her at that moment, so she could not call an ambulance.

A window in the next bus opened up and Brian with sleepy face looked out what is going on. He noticed the scenery, needed no more, retrieved back into the bus and called for help.

Donnie looked out of the bus, “For fuck sake!” he shook the sleepiness off, run outside and helped Emily to turn Jon. He noticed how bloody he was and retrieved for a wet towel to clean his face.

Danny and Jordan looked down too.

“You did fucked him pretty badly, Dan,” said Jordan.

“And Jon is not the only one,” said Danny and turned Jordan to the living room.

Joey was laying there in a fetus position, hands wrapped around his body, blue eyes widened to the maximum and slowly rocking back and forth. Jordan hissed and run to Joey to wake him up and give him some medication.

Danny sat beside Emily.

“What did you guys did last night?!” she was in such a state of shock, she yelled at him. She had no idea it was actually his mistake and his alone. He brought those shady candy. Danny bowed his head.

Emily tried to ask, but she was interrupted by Jon, who tried to say something, but only bubbled some fresh blood out of his nose. Emily rocked his upper body in her arms like a baby to shush him. “Don't worry, help is on the way.”

Donnie returned with a warm wet towel and cleaned Jon´s face and broken nose. It did not looked that bad when the blood was gone. His eyes were getting swollen, he had a lot of cuts from the rocks and concrete road and point of his nose was turned right instead of forward but all an all it was nothing not repairable. As Donnie was softly cleaning him, Jon tried to resist the pain he was causing to him.

Finally, the paramedics came. They took Jon quickly in the ambulance and then looked at Joey, who was shaking under a blanket Jordan put around his shoulders. He had a cup of black sweet coffee in his hands. He got only some injection to prevent him from vomiting and something to calm his nerves. Joey stopped shaking soon after and fell asleep in Jordan´s arms.

Danny helped Emily to stand up from the concrete she was still sitting on when Jon was taken by the paramedics, and lead her in their tour bus. 

“What will be now? We can't leave him here but we have to go to the next town. What if he is hurt badly? What if he dies? We can't leave him. We just can't,” she was mumbling from stress.

“Now now!” shushed her Donnie and hold her shoulders to keep her still: “The first thing we all do is to calm down. You need a shower and then a breakfast. After that, we call to the hospital to got to know how is Jon doing. And then we go to the next city. Ok?”

Emily was so confused and scared she only nodded, happy for someone else taking the responsibility from her and actually leading her through this hard time.  
Donnie pushed her to their bus bathroom and send Danny to fetch some of her stuff from the minibus.

When Emily got out of the bathroom, freshened and with finally calm mind, she got to know that the paramedics called.  
Jon was fine. His nose was broken on two places and it had to be straightened, and he had some minor bruises on his face that looked worse than they were. He hit the floor badly and he had a small concussion but it was nothing a good rest will not patch up.

They told Kids they can pick him up now. Danny went there in a taxi to fetch their friend. Joey was still fast asleep so they moved him to Donnie´s bed that was in the lower part, and let him sleep all that dizziness out.

Emily was sitting in the bus living room but she was not still. She had her phone with her and talked with many people about what happened and what will they do now. She worried about calling Hugo because she knew he would probably fire her. Instead, Jordan called him and put all blame to himself and other Kids, not wanting to drown Danny.

Danny brought Jon in the bus. He looked like he got into a pretty hard fight, his eyes were swollen, lip tore and his many bruises covered with plasters. HIs nose was patched up and two bloody wool tampons were blocking his nostrils.

Emily jumped up and with many sweet words run to Jon and hugged him like a worrying mother, hugging him and touching lightly his bruises, making sure they patched him up well. Then, when he got enough attention from her, she helped him to bed. He could not speak well, but it was suggested by the paramedics that he needs rest.

“How´s Joey?” asked Emily.

“Sleeping like dead,” said Jordan.

Emily had to check on him to make sure. Joey was mumbling from his sleep and he tried to hug her, when she touched his forehead, but he looked fine.

Boys opened the door to the tour bus and entered. Suddenly the whole living room was filled with people talking over each other and explaining what happened.

Emily closed the door separating living room from bedroom and clapped. Everyone shut up and looked at her.  
“Now we have to decide. Jon is unable to do any singing for at least a week and who knows how Joey will be doing tomorrow evening. But we have to continue. Everybody to their buses and let´s head to the next town,” Emily commanded.  
Boys separated from Kids and went to their own bus. Emily headed to Jaqueline to drive ahead and make everything ready in the next arena. Thank god they still had this rest of the day, evening and most of the next day for recovering of their two hurt members.


	10. Stressing out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Stress belongs to life as well as air and breathing. There is only one way to avoid stress. Die. "  
> -Hans Selye, austrian physician and scientist

Emily spend the whole day on the road with her phone on a hands-free, talking to sound and light crew who were already at the spot, preparing. She had to got some stuff done now that they lost one member and Joey will probably be almost unusable for most of the parts.

**********

Danny´s phone buzzed with a message. It almost fell off the table as the Kid´s bus turned on a roundabout.  
He reached for it, turned it on and read the sms with a smile slowly creeping up his face.

´At the arena already. Road was fine, waiting for you. Em.´ it read.

**********

Busses catched with her only one hour later. They both stopped at the arena parking lot together.

“Anything we can help with?” asked Brian with his friends behind him, when Emily got to them.

“Just do some dancing and singing rehearsals with Kids, I will manage it by myself now. And please, check on Joey if he is all right, we need him tomorrow. Do anything to make him functional, or we lost one of our leaders,” she said and her phone rang so she had to pick it up.

Jon being knocked out was not the worst news, since he was mostly the background guy with minor solos, but Joey was a different league. He sang many Kids songs alone and he also had his own part in the show while other guys were preparing themselves for NKOTBSB songs.  
Without him, she would have to think of something to fill up the time for clothes change. And probably got one of Kids to sing all Joey´s parts which was pretty hard since Joey had unique voice and his parts were not that easy to sing.

Emily was out of breath, ideas and sanity. Her work was going downwards, she was making mistake after mistake and nothing was getting better. She felt like she was not supposed to do this work. She almost called Lucy for help, but she knew Lucy was able to pick everything up and drive to her to help her and that was what she did not wanted. She wanted to be independent now she got the work and she told herself that these problems will surely fade away.

**********

Joey woke up in the evening of the free day, refreshed, but still shaky from all that body stress, and hungry like a lion. Boys intervened in Kids and took everyone to dinner. Howie and Brian were sitting with Joey and making sure he is feeling fine, eating and not vomiting. That eating part Joey filled up properly, because he ate like he starved for a week.

Jon was with them too. His lips were swollen, but he was able to eat soup and soft pancakes.  
Danny was like a beaten dog all day. He was walking with his head bowed in shame. He wanted no harm to his friends and yet, he did almost the worst. And Emily, now that she knows who did all the problems and how it happened, probably hates him. A.J. tried to cheer him up, but Danny just murmured and continued to poke his dinner with a fork. 

Joey noticed the problem: “I am not angry at you, Dan,” he said softly.  
Danny smiled at him and then his eyes turned to a beaten up Jon. He was listening to the conversation and he nodded and tried to smile, even tho his face hurt like hell.

“I did bad, I know, I knocked out two of my best friends. I can't forgive myself even tho you forgive me,” Danny said.  
The chatting around the table went silent.

Joey laughed softly, trying to turn it all in a joke “It only made me sick for a day and Jon is probably more than happy he will not be forced to show his underwear for the rest of the tour, amiright?” Joey turned to Jon who showed a thumb up. Danny smiled at that.

“So forgive yourself and we all make a funny story of it. Danny, our wannabe dealer, and how Jon examined the concrete from close up,” said Joey, grinning. Guys at the table laughed, even Jon smiled his best.

**********

Emil spend the evening running around, taking care of everything she could to make sure stuff is on its place for tomorrow. She had a serious cause of paranoia that something will surely go wrong when she is not looking.  
Crew was annoyed by her, but they said nothing to make her angry. She was like a little ball of stress, rolling around the arena, ready to blow up.

Kids and Boys came back to the arena late in the evening. They had a bedrooms ready there so they could finally sleep in a normal bed rather than in that cubical coffins in the busses.  
Jon went to bed early, still a little bit drugged from the medicaments he got, but others were still in the living room talking till late night. Emil found them sitting there, drinking and laughing and was absolutely mortified.

“You have a concert tomorrow and rehearsal in the morning. How are you still up?!” she yelped. “Especially you should be in the bed already!” she pointed at Joey, who was feeling so good he was drinking with his friends. When she put him on the spotlight, he turned red in shame, put his beer on the table and left to his bedroom.

Emily was standing there for a long time, till every Kid and Boy closed the door to their bedroom. She felt like everything is going down.  
She could not sleep that night. She was just sitting in her separated room looking at the wall. Her eyes hurt from the lack of rest and she was a bit hungry, but her body was so full of adrenaline and stress she could not close her eyes only for a moment.

Finally, her body gave up and she fell into an uneasy, restless sleep and she was already up early in the morning.  
She shook the dizziness off, walked to the starbucks nearby and bought a triple espresso to wake herself up. The barista was eyeing her with worries, but he said nothing while handling her the steaming cup of pure liquid death.  
Emily never drank coffee, only in stressful situations, and this was the biggest one she ever had. She was shaking, so she got herself a baguette on her way back home, thinking it could be of hunger, but her hands were still spastic even after food.

Kids were walking around their lovable Emily with caution. Joey wanted to hug her and give her some smooches, but she shook him off and grunted. The benjamin was so devastated, Donnie had to hug him instead.

“You do not look so good,” said Jon to her. His face was finally getting better and he could talk with a raspy voice.

“You tell me,” she said with a sting in her voice.

From that time Kids did not talked to her, they only observed as their lady slowly drives herself into a madness as the evening was approaching.

**********

While Kids and Boys were having a music preparations in the late afternoon, Emily was in their dressing room, counting all the clothes and making sure everything is on its place.

“That is a lots of work to do. Wanna help?” a high voice was heard behind her. She looked back to see Nick, casually leaning in the doorframe with his hands in his pockets.

Emily turned back to her papers and made a few notes in it: “I do not need any help, I can manage. Thanks. You should get back on the stage for the music rehearsal.”  
She felt uneasy around Nick. He was kind and funny as other Boys and Kids, but somehow Emily felt weird being with him alone. Hair on her neck stood up and cold unpleasant breeze chilled her back every time.

Nick walked towards her. He was like a tower, leaning above her. Emily turned her back to him, showing she do not want any interaction. Sometime, a few days ago, she catches him looking at her, that blue gaze full of lust. She did not wanted to look in such eyes and she always looked away.

Sadly, Nick took such a behaviour as a welcoming and shy. He put his hands on her shoulders, making her back to stiffen. Nobody used to touch her like that without her permission, except sweet innocent Joey. 

“You look so stressed, you have to loosen up. I can help with that,” he whispered in a voice that was supposed to be seductive.

Emily shook her shoulders to get him off and walked sideways, trying to concentrate on her work again, but Nick was irredeemable. He stood by her until she got annoyed and turned at him.

“I have a lot of work, Nick, I do not want you to distract me from it!” she pointed her pen at him while looking firmly into his eyes, her mouth forming a strict line.

Sadly, Nick took it as an invitation. He pushed off her hand with a pen and made a step closer. Emily took a step back, holding her folders close to her chest. Nick made another step, she did the same back, until she touched the racks with clothes behind her. Nick did a big step closer, practically caging her in between his body and the rack.

“Leave me be!” she said, but it sounded only annoyed and weak.

Nick raised one hand and neatly tucked one of her hair locks behind her ear and lowered his head closed to her. Emily raised the folder between them as a shield.

“Nick?” was heard behind them in a deep rumble. Boy´s benjamin looked back, visibly angry who the hell is disturbing the moment.

Danny was standing in the doorframe, hands, lowered by his sides, clenched up in fists.

“What do you want?” spat Nick.

“Emily,” he pointed at the lady squished behind Nick. “We need some help on the stage,” he explained coldly.

Emily quickly pushed Nick away and walked to Danny with relief on her face. She smiled at him and he repaid it. She quickly run around Danny and disappeared in the hallway.

Nick wanted to follow her, but Danny step in the way, filling the whole door frame with his shoulders: “Did they not tell you not to touch our lady? She doesn't like it,” he said and folded his hands on his chest.

“Oh, and suddenly it is YOUR problem?” said Nick with a sour smile on his face. This tiny guy just destroyed his chance to score and he was not liking that behaviour!

Danny took a sharp breath in to calm his nerves to punch this baby in the face, and leaned closer to Nick: “If I see you touching her without her permission, I will punch that dumb smile off your face.” 

Nick took it lightly, he just smirked at that threat and pushed Danny with his shoulder to get out of the room. Danny moved aside and let him pass.

**********

The afternoon went pretty well, except Emily was suddenly holding close to any Kid nearby. At the worst time she clenched closer to Howie, who was a nice company too and she felt the most safe with him from all Boys.

Joey took it as a good sign that their lovely lady is getting better with her nerves, and he was her loyal shadow. Everywhere she went, Joey was with her. She took him with her as a distraction, but mostly as a protection against Nick.  
Nick actually tried to got to her once more in the early evening when she was seemingly alone in the living room, redoing her makeup. Joey sprung up from the sofa where he was playing with his phone, when Nick came in, scaring him away.

**********

Finally the show started. Emily was so tired, she could not hold up her head to sit at her regular place at the side of the podium, watching guys. She tried, but after ten minutes of the show she felt her eyes closing. She got up and walked to the backstage, where she sat in between the empty instrumental boxes, laid her head on her arms folded on one tall box, and fell asleep so deep, even the screaming and music did not woke her up.  
She slept through the whole two hours of the show. 

Kids found her on their way back to the living room. Danny halted in front of her, adoring the way she was sleeping there. She looked so peaceful, her feet dangling in the air, hands folded under her head, mouth opened gently, her messy hair falling into her face and moving as she was breathing.

“Dan?” called Jordan to him.

“Just a minute,” he hushed them. 

“She is sleeping like dead, she will still be here when you came back,” whispered Donnie.

Danny let her sleep and got to the backstage with others to pack things and shower. When they were ready, he hurried to the stage to check on Emily.  
She was still sleeping heavily on the same spot they left her. The arena was already empty, the main lights turned off. The crew was already packing up the set.

Danny came closer to her, his bag was left unnoticed by the door. She looked like a fairy to him. When he swipe off one of her hair locks, she murmured and hid her nose in her elbow.

Jordan, Joey, Don and Jon stopped in the door, silently watching the duo.

“What's going on?” Brian, A.J., Howie and Nick showed up from the backstage and almost run into Kids standing in the hallway. Kids hushed them and hit them to keep them quiet so they do not ruin this moment.

Danny watched Emily for a second, then he took her folders from her lap and laid them nearby. As gently and slowly as he could, he wrapped his arm around her shoulders, making her grunt in discomfort.

“Shh,” he gently hushed her, gently leaned her head against his shoulder, slid his other hand under her knees and lifted her up.

Emily mumbled something from her sleep and, while suddenly losing all of her support, she wrapped her arms around Danny's neck, pressing her nose under his ear, making him hiss in response.

“Awwwwwwwwwwwww,” did Joey.

“Enough. Pack your things, gentlemen,” ordered Jordan silently and shoo Kids and Boys back to the bus. He had to pull Joey by his shirt's collar.

Danny brought Emily outside and took her to their bus. Emily shook, when the cold evening breeze got under her clothes and clutched her heat emitting carrier firmly. The rest of the Kids quickly catched up with him. Joey run forward to open the bus door and Danny carried Emily up to their bedrooms and laid her in the sixth free bed, that was supposed to be Hugo´s. 

“She looks so peaceful. Our sleeping beauty,” whispered Jordan.

“I wonder - If you kiss her, will she wake up?” add Donnie who was getting ready to sleep. His bed was on the other side of Emily.

Joey pushed Danny with his shoulder, “Go on, try it!” he whispered.

“Try what?”

“Kiss her to try if she wakes up, duh!”

Danny laughed nervously and pushed grinning Joey away. “Go to bed, ya dirty mind!” he climbed in his bed above Jon.

“I bet she would wake up,” mumbled Joey who was disappointed that his fairytale theory was not properly tested.

“Tell me, who would not wake up from Danny´s kiss?” answered Jordan from his bed.

“Yeah!” add Donnie from across the room silently: “With lips like his he has to give such a wet smooches. Nobody will sleep through that!” followed by some wet smooching noises from Joey.

A pillow flew across the corridor.

“Or he can eat that lady, his mouth is fecking giant!” chip in Jon with his raspy voice.

“OK guys, that's enough, we all got the point. Now go to sleep!” hushed them Danny, who was laughing and blushing at the same time. His pillow was thrown back to his bunk bed.

**********

Emily was sleeping so deep she woke up only once for a split second when Danny picked her up in the backstage. She felt warmth, so she instinctively hugged the source and fell asleep again.

She woke up in the late morning, when the bus was moving to another destination. She noticed that she was not driving and she got so scared, she jumped up to sitting position, hit her forehead on the top of the bunk bed, and fell back into the pillows.

Someone rushed through the corridor and Jordan´s head showed next to her: “You alright?”

“I am fine,” whimper Emily, holding her head, “only broken nose, fractured skull, black eye and a minor concussion, nothing that bad. Jon had it worse.”

Jordan laughed and pat her on the shoulder: “I am glad you are back to your old self, dear. Get up, the breakfast is getting cold.”

“What about Jacqueline?!” she panicked when she realised they left her trustworthy minibus on the parking lot.

“Toby is taking care of it, do not worry, you will have it with you this evening. But now, you have to take a break from all the work. We are in the living room after you dress up,” he got up and left the bedroom corridor.

Emily lowered her legs down from the bed. Her shoes and coat were nowhere to be seen. She had only her trousers and wrinkled blouse on. Next to the bed was her traveling bag with spare clothes and a toothbrush. She picked it up and got to the bathroom.

She realised she forgot her shampoo in the minibus so she picked one that looked the best and was not especially “for men”. She came out of the bathroom in her black tank top, white shorts and barefoot. Her wet hair smelled of mango.

“Finally, our sleeping beauty is up!” laughed Donnie when Emily opened the door to the living room in the front of the bus. Kids were sitting around the table on a sofa or chairs, having a late breakfast, Donnie was making waffles by a small kitchen counter on the other side of the room.

“Good morning everyone,” she yawned.

“Waffle?” Donnie pushed a plate full of steaming hot waffles into her hands. He had “Kill the chef” purple apron on, red mittens on his hands and a spatula in his left one.

“Yeah, thanks,” she sat next to Jon, who was slowly chewing on his waffle while making painful faces.

“I was worried you will not wake up for like a hundred years,” said Joey.

“Was I sleeping that deep?” she giggled.

“You were really like Aurora from that Disney movie! We were almost sure to force Danny to..” started Joey, but Jordan shushed him with a big chunk of a waffle with chocolate topping that he stuffed into their benjamin´s mouth.

Emily smiled with head bowed to her plate. “I had to be pretty annoying lately, hadn't I?”

“Not at all!” said Danny, too quickly for his liking.

“You have so much work with us and the events lately made you a little scared, that's all,” add Jordan while taking a new waffle on his plate.

Joey was not able to speak, since he had mouth full like a gerbil, chocolate dripping to his chin, so he only raised his thumbs up for support.

“I will get better in this work, I promise,”

Donnie turned to her with his mittened hands on his hips, “Oh no, young lady, you already are the best at your work and we do not want you to overwork yourself. From now on you will take time to chill with us. You were supposed to care of us anyway. And all we want is you with us. Am I right guys?”

Other kids nodded.  
Emily was close to crying. She was so trying to be the best for them and now she noticed she was the best from the start. It made her eyes to water up.  
Joey noticed her crying and worried they may be disturbed her, he jumped from his place, run to her and hugged her. Jon on her left did the same. Jordan and Danny followed. Donnie got to the hug from behind. Emily was trapped in a warm and redolent press of five men rocking with her from left to right.

“Donnie, you used my mango shampoo again?” asked Jordan while sniffing around.

“Not me, bro,”

“It was probably me, sorry,” mumbled Emily somewhere in between the group hug.

“Then it is fine with me,” said Jordan and rested his head on her shoulder.

“You smell amazing!” add Joey, smearing the chocolate on Emil´s chin, making her laugh. She tried to push him away.

They did not noticed the bus stopping at the gas station. The door to the living room opened and A.J. peered inside from the parking lot.

“Yeah, found them!” he yelled at someone outside, “They have a group time here!”

Kids run away from Emily like a pack of scared chicken. Only Joey hold her for a little longer until Emily pat him on his cheek, then he too left to his seat.

**********

The next arena was already prepared when they got there by the soon afternoon. Emily was almost not needed. The crew told her everything was fine and every box was on it´s place as she commanded. She was happy and finally a little bit out of stress.

“This calls for a day in the town!” yelled Jordan.

Emily had no time to react. Kids and Boys combined took her out of her “work” to a trip around the town. It was a lovely day, sun was slowly setting. Nine guys and one lady were making a bit of a disarray in the streets.

Some fangirls, who were in the town early for the show, noticed them and run to them screaming. Mostly, they were aiming for Nick, A.J., Joey, Jordan or Donnie so the others were protecting Emily from being stomped to the ground by that crazy crowd.

Suddenly, one lady noticed Emily and asked her for a selfie with her. Emily was shocked. Why she, such a random lady, was picked by NKOTBSB fangirl to take a photo with. She did not wanted to disappoint the girl, so she took the photo with her. It made her ego flutter a little bit.

All in all they had a lovely day together. Boys were telling jokes, Kids knew funny stories. One time, Emily walked around the showcase with an evening dress. They were so lovely! Dark with a heart shaped neck, short skirt in A type and a lovely addiction of lace sleeves.

Joey stopped with her, watching her looking in awe at that dress. Then he run to other guys. Emily followed others. She said to herself that the dress is too short and too sexy for her wearing it at a normal day. It could be better to wear at a party or to a club, but now she had no time at all to go partying.


	11. The Skeleton in the closet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "A woman will keep a secret, unless you tell her it's a secret."  
> -Colette, french writer

They all got back to the arena. Kids and Boys had a comfortable backstage ready for them so they could spend the rest of the time there. Emily left them, since everyone started to be a little nervous even tho they were doing this thing for many times before. Some Kids got to the “silent room”, where they, ironically, could practise the songs and warm up their voices and they did not disturbed others preparing in the living room.

Emily got her trustworthy folders and went to check everything. The changing room was filled with many different types of racks labeled with names of Kids or Boys. She check each and every one if everything was on its place. Then she got on checking the microphones.

One time, Joey´s hand microphone failed and he was singing silently for a couple of painful seconds, before he realised the problem and switched the mic with Jon, who had no single part in that song. Jon then shared microphone with Danny for the rest of the song and Emily went crazy, sprinted to the sound booth to fetch a new mic for Joey before the next part.

She heard that the rehearsal and sound check was on on the stage, she picked up the box of microphones and ear-sized reproductors Kids and Boys used to hear the playing song in their ears directly instead of an echo in the arena. She then took the box up to the stage.

Boys and Kids were already practising there while technicians were checking their raising platforms and smoke machines if everything works as it should have.

Emily was handing out the microphones and reproductors to corresponding singer. She had no problem with guessing which set is whose. Everything was properly labeled with a tiny nickname and colour of a specific singer so microphone could fit their voice and reproductor their shape of ear.

While she was handing out the set to Howie, helping him put on the ear device, A.J. and Brian were pushing Nick and heckling him and he was arguing with them and laughing.

Before Kids could react, Nick decided it was enough heckling for him, pushed poor confused Howie aside and stepped closer to her.

“I have no time for you right now.” she said strictly.

“But I think it's the best time ever.” answered Nick gently. He wrapped his arm around her waist.

In that moment, technicians decided to test their smoke machines at once. The stage was filled with sweetly scented smoke white as milk. No one saw further than on their own noses.

When the smoke faded away a little bit, a scene half horrifying and half sweet was revealed to everyone.

Nick grasped Emily into a bear hug, leaned her back so she was touching the ground only with her heels, and kissed her passionately.  
They were still frozen in the kiss when the smoke disappeared.  
Emily was so shocked, she did nothing, only widened her eyes at Nick, whose eyes were closed in the kiss. She dropped the box she was still holding in one of her hands and the heavy microphones rolled around loudly.

Brian made a tiny “awww”. A.J. smiled proudly. Howie giggled at that scenery. Their baby boy is finally acting all grown up.

On the other side of the stage, Joeys mouth dropped to the floor. Jordan had to hold onto his brother as his legs almost gave up under him. Donnie reached for their last member but he missed.

Nick tried to involve tongue in the kiss, but Emily clanged her teeth together leaving him no space to show her how skillful he is in kissing. It was a very wet kiss since Nick did his best to force her teeth apart.

He was half way in breaking the sweet kiss when something resembling of a force of a tank in full speed hit him. Nick let Emily go in such a rush she did not gained her ballance back and fell right on her butt.

Joey and Donnie were first by her, helping her up. She was shocked from the kiss and shooked from the fall at the same time. Her face was red and hot and her ears were fizzling with blood in the head.

She heard only a loud thud and a growling. Then she looked back where Nick disappeared from her view.

Nick landed on his back like a turn over turtle. Danny was standing above him, hands clenched into fists.

“Bro, what the hell?!” yelped Nick while getting up clumsily, touching his jaw where Danny hit him while crashing into him.

“You remember what I told you lately?” growled Danny, shaking of adrenalin.

Nick sprung up and stood close to Danny, exceeding him over one and a half head. “And what if not?” he said in his high pitched annoying voice.

Meanwhile, Jon jumped near to help Emily. She got pulled up on her knees and she immediately clinged onto Jon. He hold her close and caresed her back to calm her down.

Danny lifted his fists, Nick did the same. They watched each other almost nose to nose.

“What are you up to, dwarf?! Protecting your princess?” said Nick.

He realised he overshot, after a strong fist landed on his cheek, turning his head sideways. Nick stumbled back, holding his face.   
“You…!” he raised voice and they both stepped closer.

Danny was about to wind up another mighty blow, when Nick hit him in the stomach. That sudden blow made Danny to bend forward, where he got the second hit in his chin. His teeth clicked together and he made a few steps back. 

Joey did a step up, but Donnie hold him. Walking there at this moment was like jumping in between two metal gears. Joey and his gentle fragile body would be smashed and crumbled into pieces if he tries to stand between Danny and Nick now.

Danny touched his mouth. In that last hit he accidentally bit through his lower lip that started to bleed onto his chin. He wiped the blood and stood firmly again.  
Nick run towards him, giving him another three strong hits, one into the chest and two focused on head. Danny managed to block two of them, the third one hit him on the temple, but he was able to send one fist to Nick too.  
“Not so tough now are we?!” laughed NIck evilly while hitting Danny. If Dan wanted to fight for the lady, he would give him the pleasure to do so.  
He was not able to tease The Kid anymore. The last blow of Danny was so perfectly calculated, or plain lucky, he hit Nick's face straight. A loud ugly ´krump´ sound was heard, as Nick's nose cartilage gave up and he sat on his butt, holding his bleeding face.

Brian and Jordan jumped closer, knowing the fight is probably over. Jordan hold Danny on his biceps that was shaking. Danny almost hit him too, how pumped he was to fight, but he stopped just as he seen Jordan´s freaked out face.

Emily was huddled in Jon´s arms, who was protecting her, disappointed look settled on his face. Tears were rolling down her face from all that stress, sudden kiss and the fight. She hated when people were fighting, more so, over her.

Danny blinked the rage out of his eyes and lowered his arms, making Brian and Jordan sight in relief they do not need to hung on their friends to stop them killing each other. Brian was sitting next to Nick, who was mumbling complains and showing Brian his wound. His eyes were full of tears. Who knew if those were tears of pain or hatred. Nick had a red cheek that was about to turn purple in a matter of minutes, and his nose was broken and bleeding profusely.

Danny allowed Jordan to lead him aside. His mouth was bleeding and staining his white tank top and he had a red mark on his temple.

“Well that was unexpecting,” said A.J. who kneeled to support Nick´s back in a sitting position.

“She did not expected it either!” growled Joey, who was standing in front of Emily and Jon like a protective dog on a leash.

“He did nothing bad to be punished that way!” speak Brian up. His mostly calm voice now having a sting of anger in it. He tried his best to clean Nick's bleeding nose. Nick started coughing out the blood that was spilling back into his mouth. Howie was more active and run for paramedics who were outside, chilling in their ambulance.

“What was all that about anyway?” said Jon with a muffled voice, his nose was still covered with a plaster and half clogged with old blood. Emily huddled closer to him and hid her face in his shoulder.

“What was what?!” spit A.J. angrily. “He just wanted to show his feelings for this lady. Unconventional, I know, but he did not deserved such a reaction.”

Joey smirked “Yeah, attacking a lady who has another suitor, that was a great idea!”

“How should we know?!” answered Brian.

“He could ask,” Joey made a step closer to him.

“ENOUGH OF THIS!” yelled Donnie, who was the only one who still had a cold head there. Joey immediately listened to him and backed up. Brian umbrage and attended to Nick when paramedics were finally on the stage.

Donnie continued “Listen, I know some mistakes were made. Now we all know better. Let's not make too big fuss about, ok?” He turned at Boys “got him fixed before the show, we all need him.” then he looked at the rest of the Kids with Emily and his voice softened a little “Jon, you know best what to do to calm her down. It´s onto you, buddy.”

Jon nodded and lead Emily off the stage and back to the bus. They walked past Jordan who was patting Danny on his back, seriously puzzled on how to calm someone. He had no experience in it but he did his best.  
When they got closer, Danny looked up and Emily turned at him. Her cheeks flushed red and she hid her face in Jon´s arms as he lead her around. She had no idea if she should feel angry or flattered. Mostly, she felt both. Angry at Nick´s temerity, angry at them fighting and hurting each other, yet flattered Dan stood for her, although in an unconventional way.

Danny watched them leaving, sat on a small speaker box and put his chin into his hands. Jordan kept patting him in compassion.

**********

Emily run to the bus and Jon closed the door behind them.

“Drink?” he asked immediately.

Emily nodded and he reached into Donnie´s personal supplies and brought two short glasses and a whiskey. Emily turned her first short into herself without hesitation. Jon raised one eyebrow, but questioned nothing and gave her a second one.  
Jon sat beside her. They were sitting there awkwardly, sipping from their whiskey glasses.

“So,” started Jon and coughed “did you knew he had some...deeper feelings for you?”

“I really hoped he had some, but I was still not sure,” she sighed.

Jon looked at her, horrified.

Emily turned her eyes at him, they were hazy with sweet memories, then she blinked and realised, “oh you mean Nick?! No! Nonono I had no idea,” she mumbled something with her nose in her whiskey glass.

Jon continued to drink his whiskey but he was holding back laughter. Emily pushed him with her elbow and he spilled his drink all over himself.

“Careful” he laughed “Donnie will kill me when he gots to know we drank his whiskey, even worse, spilled it all around!”

Emily was red from ears to toes. She huddled on the couch, resting her chin on her knees. “Do not tell others please.”

“I do not need to tell them,” he hugged her, “They already know.”

“WHAT?!” Emily yelped.

Jon laughed so hard he had to hold his nose, because it started to hurt again. She waited impatiently for him to stop laughing and ow-ing from the pain. Finally, he catched some breath. “Isn't it obvious? Dan is madly into you. He would not attack if he had no reason to do so,” he was still chuckling.

“Nick called him a dwarf,” said Emily sarcastically,

“Yeah that's right,” giggled Jon, “we all know how sensitive he is on this topic. Yet it was not basically because of the height differences.”

Emily hid her face behind her knees and fell silent for a minute, “Who else except you knows?”

“Well, all Kids for a few days, and after this incident, all Boys, the crew, sound assistant, arena owner, the local janitor and a few innocent pedestrians outside the arena who heard them scream at each other,”

Emily whined and hid her face whole, her ears bright red.

“Do not worry, They maybe know about him, but they probably have no idea you share the same feelings, at least Danny is pretty puzzled right now. And I will not tell a living soul,” he pat her on the knee.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

Another silence fell between them. Finally Emily calmed down and her face got a normal colour, “Well, if we are at the secrets, will you tell them yours one anyday?”

Jon looked at her with wide eyes, then he sat closer to her, pulled his knees up to his chest as she did, and rested his chin on top of them. “I have no idea how they will react. They know about my anxiety and they got used to it well, but I believe they will not accept me as I am when they will got to know. Especially Jordan. You know how he is with ladies.” Jon looked at Emily and she nodded.  
Jordan was really a handsome lad who seduced ladies only by looking at them. He was that type of person who would not accept this change in his brother´s sexuality.

Jon even said that Jordan tried his best to got him some ladies before, but Jon always declined the dates, hiding behind his anxiety.  
“Perhaps you can tell it to someone else first. Like Joey or Danny, maybe they will understand it better and then they will help you approach your brother,” she suggested.

Jon laughed, but it was a bitter laugh “If I tried it with Joey, he would probably panicked and fainted and then he will tell everyone. Danny has his own problems now. Maybe Donnie would understand. Do you think it would be a good idea?”

Emily nodded. Jon sighed “Maybe it is for good to tell them. I have to say, I need to see him again. I mean Harley. I miss him.” he bowed his head. “And he is probably with some lovely lady and I don't even know about it.”  
Emily patted him on the shoulder, then she hugged him. He hugged back.

Like called from above, the door to the bus unlocked and opened and Donnie showed inside, alone, with his spare bus keys. He saw them sitting there, holding two glasses and his whiskey on the table.  
He breathed in to start yelling, then he remembered in what occasion they looked into his personal supplies, shrugged, picked third whiskey glass and poured one for himself. He fell into a comfortable small armchair next to the couple on the sofa.

Emily elbowed Jon and twitched her head to Donnie. Jon hesitated.

“Jon wants to tell you something,” she started and Jonathan had no time to react and stop her.

Donnie looked up. He was tired of the day so he listened with only mild interest.

Jon was coughing and he had no words. When Emily tried to help him, he shushed her. This was his fight. Emily hid her nose in her glass. His stagger made Donnie curious.

“The thing is that. I...you know...well you do not know, how could you...well I am…It's really hard for me to say it but I am...”

“Gay, and?” helped him Donnie.

“Yeah that, I am g...wait...HOW DO YOU?!” he yelped when he realised.

Donnie was sitting there, twirling his glass of whiskey, smiling from ear to ear.

Emily thought there is no secret to be kept in this group. She took a big gulp from her glass. The alcohol burned her throat.

Jon sat there, completely frozen, his mouth open, staring at his friend.

“Oh, you thought you were so stealthy, don´t you?” said Donnie, giggling.

Jon turned red as a beet and gulped the whole remaining whiskey in the glass he had in hand. “When did you noticed? And more important - does Jordan knows?” he asked silently.  
“Do not worry,” calmed him Donnie “Jordan has no idea for now. And I noticed years back. You were always unsure with ladies. I ascribed it to your anxiety, but then I realised it may not be the case. I just made some detective work by myself,” he winked.

“And is it...bad?” asked Jon and realised this sentence sounded better in his head.

“You mean, if you liking men, changes anything between us?” asked Donnie with surprise in his voice “Not at all, buddy. What do you think will change? That I would think you like me? Well...I am a handsome man after all,” he turned it into a joke, making Jon smile, then he continued. “I am not scared or disgusted of you at any way if you are asking. It is your life and I like you as usual. As a friend I think!” he added quickly, making Jon giggle this time.

“Well, that went better than I hoped for,” mumbled Emily.

“I believe others will take it the same as I did,” reassured them Donnie.

“We can verify it right now. Guess who is coming?” said Emily when she heard the noises outside the bus. Clearly, the rest of the Kids were going in.

Jon sighed and stood up. He felt more confident talking with his brother and the rest of the Kids this way, than being huddled on the sofa next to Emily.

Jordan, Joey and Danny went in the bus and froze by the door. They saw those three sitting and standing there and that heavy air of something unspoken made them stop talking.

“Guys,” said Jon but stopped and looked at Emily and Donnie for help. Emily stood up and hold his hand. Donnie stood up as well. The remaining trio was gazing at them confusingly. This weird aura in the room only happens when someone has to say they are going to marry, have only a month to live, are having a baby or something like that.

“Is someone dying?” asked Joey and his voice hitched in a high note when he started to realise something is going to change.

“Nononono!” Emily hurry to calm him.

“Iamgay,” said Jon quickly. He came to an opinion that this type of answer will be like a removing a patch. Quick and painless.

Joey had to process the new information for a while.  
Danny just nodded, he felt ashamed and sorry for his behaviour before, and he looked like he already knew the news. He made a reassuring smile to Jon.  
Jordan stood there, frozen to the ground. Then he blinked the surprise of his eyes, “I was kinda aware that you are...different?” he had no idea how to address such a sensitive topic.

Jon looked like he got smaller, he bowed his head and lowered his shoulders, “Is it that bad for you to know?” he asked.

Jordan did not answered. He made a few steps forward, walked around Emily and fell into his tall brother's arms, hugging him tightly, “Of course not,”  
Jon sighed in relief. Emily did the same. Donnie sipped from his glass and sat back down.

Danny pat Jon on the shoulder to let him know he is proud of him and then he left.  
There was a spare room on the back of the bus. They called it “the calming room” since there was a giant sofa all around the walls, many pillows, a radio, computer and a TV to chill by to. Danny locked himself there to got some privacy for a few minutes. Also, Jordan send him there before they entered the bus to let him rest. He had a small white plaster on his bottom lip and the red mark on his temple started to turn blue.

Finally, Joey´s excited brain processed the new information and he jumped at Jon, giggling and hugging him like he just gave him a puppy. “Do you have a lover yet?” he asked. His question was sincere. Joey actually wanted to know it and his pure heart had no mischief or ire in it.

Jon smiled shyly and told them about his secret love that he admires but has no idea if he shares the same feelings. They sat around him, giving him advices and questioning if Harley is into him or not and how to get to know it.

**********

Emily had to left the bus early, since the show was about to start in two hours.  
Kids could stay for longer just to calm down and prepare. Thankfully, Danny left his isolation after a few good minutes while all Kids and Emily were still together, and he sat beside them silently. His rage went away as fast as it came and he was only ashamed of his behaviour.  
Even tho they were still a bit mad at him, they did not showed it. Emily even brought him a few ice cubes in a clean cloth and pressed it onto his hurt temple. He hissed at such surprising cold sensation, but when she picked his hand and pressed it onto the ice cubes to hold it in place, he only thanked. Emily said nothing and left.

She got to the arena only to find Boys there.  
Brian was walking back and forth on the stage, his arms folded behind his back, his pretty face, always ready to smile, was now frowning. Howie was fiddling with his microphone. A.J. sat on the speaker, looking at the ground. The same did Nick seated nearby. His nose was broken and he had a white plaster on the side of it, where Danny tore his skin and to kinda hold the poor gristle on place. He had red cheek and a black eye showing up quickly.

When she walked on the stage, all Boys looked up. Brian left the stage and almost bumped into her. Howie stopped playing with the microphone, stood up and went on the other side of the stage.

Emily did not reacted to them, she can talk with them both lately. She sat beside Nick this time. A.J. watched them cautiously, he did not wanted anyone to hurt Nick more.

“Leave me be,” mumbled Nick.

“I am sorry about what happened,” she lowered her head to look into his eyes but Nick turned his head away.  
“I will not say anything like ´You deserve this´or apologise for Danny´s behaviour, but I just want to tell you that that incident changes nothing to me. You all are still amazing and I like you all the same as before,” she put her small hand on Nick's shoulder.  
He hitched. It was a silent sob but it shook with his back. A.J. shifted closer, watching Emily, but now he was not looking angrily, he was only sad.

Emily shared a silent look with A.J., then she run her hand across Nick´s back “How about we forgot that anything happened here and we all be a happy friends again? And forgive Danny and others for their behaviour,” she suggested.

“That will be pretty hard,” growled Nick.

Howie and Brian came back since it was almost time to start and the fangirls were piling up by the main door.

Emily pat him on the back once again and left. Brian was never angry at a lady, but now, she walked in a big circle around him, just in caution.

Kids were in a better mood. Joey was still a happy little puppy who did his best to cheer everyone up for the upcoming event. They could not pull down their fans only because they had a small argue with Boys.

Joey even tried to visit Boys, but Howie did not let him enter the room and gently turned him away.  
Nick was able to sing, he just had to put on a ton of makeup to cover small bruises and a black eye, but he had to leave the plaster on his nose for the whole time.

Emily spend the rest of the evening in her minibus. She did not wanted to attend the show. She knew well they will be happy, laughing and friendly on the stage for the fans to enjoy, but after it, they will growl at each other once again.  
She only hoped that it will slowly fade away as the time goes on. She was so tired, her eyes were closing. This was one hell of a day. She climbed into her minibus bed and buried herself under the sheets. She was asleep even before she touched the pillow.

**********

There were only three more towns to go and three shows to attend to. Emily was kinda worried that after it, Kids would not need her anymore and she felt a little scared. So from that time she did her best to not only be the most useful as she could be, but she did everything to got Kids and Boys back together. It was kinda her fault they argued at first.

The next town was seated in a pretty hot area. It was almost 40°C and everyone were slowly steaming in their black busses altho the AC was on all the time.  
Emily was able to find the best ice cream shop at the next stop and brought ten different boxes of different flavours, ten small plastic bowls, spoons and even an ice cream scoop.

She brought it all into the empty arena, ready for the evening, and made herself a small stand from the empty sound boxes. Then she called Kids and Boys to got there.  
They dragged themselves to her, all in their tank tops or half naked as Donnie, Danny and A.J. Somehow, Jon was able to wear long sleeved shirt all the time and not die from overheating.

When they saw her and that homemade ice cream shop, they cheered up. She had ten different flavours, so there was at least one for everyone. Joey was so happy, he asked for all flavours in his bowl, then he sat at a free box in a lotus position, and dug into his portion like a hungry lion.

Even tho both groups were still mad, they accepted the ice cream and seated around the arena. Emily noticed they still separated into their own groups - Kids to Kids, Boys to Boys. Nobody was sitting together or even near the others. Emily felt like they are Capulets and Montagues and she was the lonely Julia captured between two Romeos.

**********

The show started soon after their ice cream party. Emily was pretty well rested from the last night, so she took her usual place nearby the podium.  
Kids and Boys acted so perfectly in sync, nobody would notice there is bad blood between them.

Jordan even did his half-naked show during Dirty dancing, pulling his black tank top over his head and leaving it hanging over his shoulders. Emily covered her eyes and blushed. She had no idea why. She saw all of them in their undies a few times before, even Jon that one time, but the way he danced seductively made her feel as the fangirl she used to be.  
I am still a fangirl, she said to herself.   
She noticed Danny on the side of the stage. He saw her and waved a little, testing if she is still angry. She replied with a tiny wave too. His face lit up and that made her smile. She just could not stay angry at him for long.

**********

Emily did all she could to reconcile both groups with a big help of Joey. They managed to turn Howie to their side, so he could help them make Boys and Kids friends again.  
Nick was fine with his injuries, but he strictly avoided Danny. Jon was also pretty healed up after a few days of Emily's care for his wounds from the drug accident, so he could at least stand there, do a little dances and sing softly. His nose was already healed, but some muscles in his face still hurt when he smiled or sang too heartfully.

The last two tour stops run without any problems, because Kids did their best not to stress their production lady, and Boys were just too good-natured to make problems. Also, Nick was too pretty decent and calm for his nature.

Emily walked between the groups like a ghost. Everybody listened to her, but nobody was actually talking to her personally. Even Joey got tired of constant trying to cheer everyone up, and spend most of his time on the lit up stage, practising dancing and singing by himself.

On the last day of the tour, Emily felt so pushed away, she searched for Joey, only to find him on the stage again.  
What was her surprise to find him in his white skinny jeans, barefoot and half naked, dancing to “Sweet Dreams” by Eurythmics. Guys in the sound and light department were visibly on their places, since the light was shining only at Joey, making his milk white skin to glow.

Emily only wanted a lovely hug by their group crown hugger. Now she stood there in awe, as the Kids baby performed the most sexy and lascivious dance she ever saw. She knew he was a handsome man, but his actions on the stage made her cheeks red and heart beat faster.

She sat there, unnoticed, as Joey run around the stage, looking somewhere in the no-existing crowd, writhing like a majestic cobra. He even did a few push-ups on one hand, grinding his hips against the floor, making Emily to push her fist in her mouth so she would not yelp.

The magic was broken as some light crew noticed Emily and turned their spotlight from Joey to her, making her blind for a second.

“EMILY?!” yelped Joey and for some reason, he covered his naked chest with his arms like a shy lady caught in a bathroom.

She stepped out from the bright light into the darkness next to it, “I am sorry if I disturbed you, I was just caught by your acting.” she sighed. “I was also looking for a hug, but there was nobody to give it to me.” she sounded sad and lonely.

Joey got to her, he let his arms fell by his sides. His chest was shining with sweat and he was breathing heavily from the performance. Emily always saw him as the cuddly sweet and lovable puppy of the group, but she realised this guy, if he wants to, can be incredibly seductive and sexy. His hair was pointing upwards even tho he was all sweaty. His eyes shined with dark blue irises.  
Emily had no idea how and what to feel anymore.

“Give me a minute to take a shower and you can have the biggest hug that ever hugged.” he said while drying his wet hair and chest with a towel he had ready beside the sound speakers “Or,” he said with a smirk and leaned closer to her ear “you can have that hug while I shower.”

Emily froze to the ground, her intestines made a pleased loop and her knees trembled. Then she realised his wicked smile and she pushed him aside. He obviously meant it as a joke, but it seriously made her question her choices for a split of a second.

Joey laughed and run to the backstage bathroom to get a quick shower.

Emily sneak into the living room where other Kids were.  
Jordan was sitting by the big mirror, making his skin smooth and flawless for the upcoming concert. Jon was sitting in the chair, reading a book. Donnie seated his ass on the sofa, legs comfortably stretched across it, and he tried to solve a crossword while nibbling on the pen. Danny was obviously forgiven of his behaviour before, because he was sitting by Donnie´s legs, on the other side of the sofa, and tried to catch some sleep.  
Joey run from the bathroom as soon as he put on clean underwear, and found Emily standing in the living room. He honoured his word and gave her the biggest, and also the wettest hug, since he did not dry himself from the shower. Emily giggled, as Joey also gave her a kiss on the cheek, his lips were cold as ice.

“I really should take the shower with you.” she said, giggling. “I should be less wet as I am now at least.”

The rest of the four boys turned their heads in surprise. Donnie pressed Danny into the sofa with his legs he put across his lap, to prevent him from standing up.

Joey let Emily go when he saw the reaction of others “I bet it sounded better in your head.” he mumbled, pat her on the head and got lost to find some more clothes.

Emily watched those four guys and they watched her. Then, suddenly, they all burst in laughing all at once. That out of breath laugh of Kids was the best sound, Emily could hear.

Kids were having a better mood for the whole show and they infected Boys as well.  
Nick and Danny still avoided each other, but all in all, they acted as friends again. Danny did his best to get on the good note with Boys and he even brought menthol pastilles on the stage to share with everyone.  
Boys took it gratefully, since they were singing for a hour now and their throats were dry and scratchy.   
Emily watched their behaviour from her usual seat, hoping nothing will turn wrong in front of the fans.

Howie took one pastille and he left with short thanks. Brian talked with Danny for a longer time, they were both laughing, which was a good sign. A.J. waved at him, that he does not need any pastilles. Nick walked around Danny cautiously. Then, when he was too occupied by chat with Brian, he reached into the small metal box Dan was holding, snatched a handful of pastilles and shoved them in his mouth all at once.  
Emily thought about how childish that was, but on the second thought, it was a sign Nick was slowly forgiving Dan and food was the best way to got to his heart. His nose and bruises were all healed up, only the black eye was still showing, but thanks to a strong makeup, it was not visible on the stage.  
Jon was all right at that time, he only had a few pink scars on his cheeks and nose and he could sing again at full force now. But he was strictly against any more butt showing.


End file.
